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THE.    ^z-^--^':^- 


LIBRARY  MAGAZINE 


IMERICAK  AND  FOREIGN  THOUGHT. 


voL'tf:Ntii„.yijl. 


Kew  Yobe: 
AMEBIOAN  BOOK  EZGHAKGE, 
764  Bboadway. 
1881. 


THE  NEW  YORK 
1  PUBLIC  LIBRARY! 

64S.S.57 

AftTOR,  LENOX  V»0 
TILDEN   FOUNDATIONS 


19^3 


PUBLISHER'S  NOTICE. 


n 


-.1 

•■  \ 

■1 


The  Library  Magazine  was  originally  started  as  a  monthly, 
ten  cents  a  number,  $i.oo  a  year,  its  contents  being  limited  to  choici 
selections  from  English  and  continental  magazines  and  reviews,  thu 
occupying  a  field  similar  to  the  old  and  excellent  Littell's  Living  Ag 
'and  Eclectic  Magazine,  discarding, however,  all  fiction  and  distinctive!  j 
light  literature,  and  supplying  the  very  best  that  they  contain,  at  ahov 
one  fourth  their  cost. 

In  consonance  with  the  maxim,  **  what  is  worth  reading  is  wort 
jpreserving,"  a  form  of  publication  was  adopted  with  a  special  view  t^ 
convenience  for  reference  and  binding,  and  beginning  with  September 
l88o,  each  issue  forms  a  complete  bound  volume.     This  innovation  ij 
recognized  as  being  of  very  great  value  to  real  students  of  literature. 

Beginning  with  the  issue  for  December,  i88o,  American  topics,  trea^ 
ed  by  American  thi^ikers  and  \;^it^r%  of-est^bl'^fhed  reputation  in  liter 
ture,  are  introduced.  Thr  Ltbrahy  MAGAZiJfE  undertakes  to  occup^ 
so  high  a  stand  that  it. shall  be  cojxsjd^ri^d  an  indispensable  part  of  thJ 
library  of  every  American  who  asj^irc^-io  the  broadest  culture,  an^ 
desires  to  keep  fully  abreast  With  fhe^proi^ress  of  American  and  trans 
atlantic  thought.  The  contenrs  of  any  yoltime  will  indicate  how  wel 
it  succeeds  in  this  ambitious  att&iiipt.        - 


CONTENTS. 


/ 


Beyond  .     David  Swing ', 1 1 

A  Vermont  Ruskin.    The  Spectator xj 

English  Orthography.    F.  A.  March,  LL.D aa 

Study  of  History.    Edward  A.  Freeman 3a 

Literary  Profession  in  the  South.    Margaret  J.  Preston 60 

Reminiscences  of  the  High  Church  Revival.    James  Anthony  Froude 74 

The  Esthetics  in  Parliament.    Justin  H.  McCarthy 87 

A  Day  with  Liszt  in  1880.    H.  R.  Haweis 106 

The  Study  of  Shakespeare.    Joseph  Crosby 121 

Genius  AND  Method.    Temple  Bar 136 

"Who  wrote  "  Gil  Blas"  ?    Henri  Van  Laun 151 

The  Morality  of  the  Profession  of  Leiters.    Robert  Louis  Stevenson 176 

Thoaias  Carlylb.     Mrs.  Oliphant' 187 

Political  Differentiation.    Herbert  S^nj^cr, ,..^»j^... 215 

Modern  Italian  Poets.     Fr^ois  JrlitGU^r ,...  .\,  ,..>.. c. 236 

A  Night  os  Mount  WASHiM}1i«r?.     Pi</f.  G.  W.'Blaikie,..*!.^ 257 

Byron  in  Greece.    Temple  Bar. , -.  271 

^^Carlyle's  Lectures  on  the  PERi^j^i'OF^SL'RdPEAN. Culture.    Prof.  Edward 

Dowden .; ..^ . ! ,  .  ^  ^ < .  t .  .-t 283 

What  Became  of  Cromwell  ?    Genth3?a;i*e  Magaiine  ^  ., 31  x 

The  United  States  as  a  Field  for  AxsKictjLTUkAt  Se-Htlers.    The  •  Earl  of 

Airl ie Im. "../>/.."..'. .•.:..'..: 327 

On  Novels  and  Novel-Makers.     Good  Words 342 

How  TO  READ  Books.    John  Dennis 356 

William  Prescott  at  Bunker  Hill.    Robert  C.  Winthrop 369 

The  First  Printed  Book  Known.    M.  W.  Conway 393 

The    Revised  Version  of- the  English  New  Testament.    Alexander  Rob- 

ert9,^.D 403 

Sir  David  Brewster.and  Sir  John  Herschhl.    Alexander  Strahan 424 

CuAiiLEs  DiCKEN's  IN  THE  Editor's  Chair.    Gentleman's  Magazine 436 

Justice  to  Braconsfield.    George  M.  Towle * 456 

The  Sword.     Blackwood's  Magazine 461. 

Eakly  Life  of  Thomas  Carlyle.    J.  A.  Froude 49* 

Anecdotes  of  Bibles.    Chambers's  Journal 54» 


Iv 


COISTTENTS, 


PAG 

Thb  First  Englkh  Post.    William  Allingham 

BoNAPARTB.    J.  R.  Seeley 553 

Thb  Origin  of  London.    Cornhill  Magazine 59 

William  Blake.    Frederick  Wedmore ; .- ..  .  6ij 

Francis  Brbt  Harte.    M.  S.  V.  de  V 63I 

Gossip  of  an  Old  Bookworm.    W.  J.  Thorns 63J 

Cuneiform  Writing.    W.  O.  Sproull,  Ph.D 66^ 

Bngush  and  American  English.    Richard  A.  Proctor 674 

Dogs  of  Litmrature.    Temple  Bar 

Thb  British  Census  of  i88z.    Chambers's  Journal 7al 

Thb  Great  Discovery  in  Egypt.    The  Saturday  Review 7^ 

Amothbr  World  down  Hbrx.    W.  Mattieu  Williams 74J 


\    .  -  S   I,  ' 


/ 


THE   LIBRARY   MAGAZINE. 


VOLUME  8,  OCTOBER,  1881. 


BEYOND. 


Man's  senses  do  not  disclose  the  world  to  his  mind :  they  only 
suggest  it.  The  eye  is  of  amazing  utility,  and  yet  it  sees  only  a 
small  part  of  the  landscape.  Standing  on  the  shore  of  the  deep, 
man  can  make  a  survey  of  twelve  miles  of  wave  and  sparkle. 
The  main  ocean  lies  wholly  out  of  reach  of  his  eye  and  ear  and 
touch.  Yet  from  such  an  outlook,  from  a  coast,  this  sensitive 
^creature  turns  away  toward  his  cottage  with  his  heart  full  of  the 
thought  that  it  has  seen  immensity.  Perhaps  the  heiart  did:  the 
eye  did  not.  This  same  mortal  climbs  a  hill  inland  and  sees  a 
valley  outstretching  in  all  directions,  and  he  once  more  feels 
that  something  awful  has  just  come  into  his  soul  through  his 
sight.  True  enough,  but  that  grand  something  was  not  that 
valley.  In  both  these  instances  the  objects  so  viewed  and 
admired  were  greater  than  those  dimensions  taken  in  by  the 
sense.  These' surveys  by  the  eye  only  suggested  a  vast  expanse 
that  was  not  seen.  Sense,  therefore,  suggests  rather  than  reveals. 
Man  is  an  animal  wholly  pervaded  by  the — Beyond.  What  his 
sense  perceives, he  at  once  multiplies  by  thousands  and  millions, 
and  thinks  not  of  the  unit  upon  which  he  began  his  mathemat- 
ical operation.  His  five  senses  are  only  the  little  seeds  which, 
by  an  instantaneous  process,  not  known  to  gardeners,  rise  up 
into  trees  and  in  a  second  pass  to  leaf  and  flower  and  fruit.  In 
music  the  ear  becomes  not  a  realization  but  a  suggestion,  for 


12  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

no  sooner  does  a  performer  awaken  pleasure  than  a\^ '  -  .  n e  n  <  ind 
goes  in  pursuit  of  a  larger  orchestra  and  a  more  hea\  ■  /  i^^^sic ; 
and  when  this  delighted  soul  is  done  with  the  actuf..  ,uv  jg  it 
has  been  off  in  the  clouds,  it  has  been  multiplying,^  i  »p  /s  by 
tens  and  its  tens  by  hundreds.  Its  original  penr.  ^  urned 
into  a  fortune. 

We  pity  those  women  of  India  who  pass  life  in  housrs  which 
have  no  outer  windows  but  have  only  windows  that  open  into 
an  interior  court,  and  who,  when  transferred  from  one  house  to 
another,  are  conveyed  in  close  carriages  which  have  a  window 
only  in  the  top.  Of  these  women  some  reach  old  age  without 
ever  having  seen  a  field  or  a  forest,^  or  even  trees  and  flowers ; 
but  these  slaves  of  masculine  jealousy  are  emblems  of  man  were 
he  left  to  the  exact  report  of  only  his  five  senses,  for  they  oper- 
ate in  only  a  small  area,  they  are  windows  opening  into  a 
limited  court.  The  perceptions  of  sense  are  only  a  basis  of 
subsequent  mental  action,  and  it  is  this  subsequent  action  which 
gives  to  man  his  breadth  of  knowledge  and  pojjrer  of  compre- 
hension. Nature  really  lies  beyond  the  human  ken ;  and  whefi 
man  has  eyes  only,  and  no  spiritual  or  mental^  vision,  he  is  a 
rather  small  specim^i  of  animal  life.  As  seen  in  the  science  of 
Darwin  or  in  the  account  in  Genesis,  man  was  a  creature  of  very- 
narrow  knowledge  and  mental  power.  To  Adam's  eyes  Eve 
was  a  greater  personage  than  the  Deity,  for  Eve  was  a  visible, 
audible  object,  and  that  fact  gave  her  a  wonderful  advantage  in 
this  local  court.  It  was  when  man  got  away  from  his  physical 
standards  and  began  to  use  that  faculty  which  looks  into  the 
"  beyond,"  that  the  universe  began  to  appear  and  the  woman 
and  the  apple  and  the  whole  Eden  affair  to  assume  small  pro- 
portions in  the  midst  of  the  vast  scene. 

The  conclusion  is  therefore  gently  forced  upon  us  that  man 
possesses  a  separate  faculty  called  "imagination,"  or  "idealism," 
which  is  his  real  instructor  and  surveyor.  Estimated  by  his 
senses,  man  is  remarkable  for  his  poverty;  estimated  by  the 
treasures  his  iniagination  brings  he  is  remarkable  for  his  riches. 


BEYOND,  13 

From  the  little  visible  he  proceeds  to  the  immense  invisible. 
"  Borrowing  from  Castelar,  we  affirm  that  nature  gives  the  toiler 
only  the  plain  girl  Leah  at  the  end  of  the  first  service,  and  then 
by  granting  the  more  beautiful  Rachel  the  toiler  is  enticed  into 
seven  more  years  of  industry.  Leah  comes  as  a  reward  of  the 
first  outlook,  Rachel  as  the  prize  of  the  imagination.  This  fac- 
ulty is  c^ie  window  throuo^'i  which  man  gazes  into  eternity.  It 
is  the  real  eye  of  man.  In  the  physical  senses  the  Creator  made 
only  a  moderate  provision  for  his  rational  creature.  Those  out- 
reachings  answer  the  purpose  of  the  Indian,  who  desires  only 
plenty  of  buffalo,  and  for  the  Esquimau,  who  need  only  seek 
for  the  white  bear  and  the  walrus ;  but  the  moment  man  would 
cross  the  line  of  barbarism  a  demand  springs  up  for  some  new 
power  of  acquisition  and  of  happiness.  Providence  relents,  and 
in  the  zenana  houses  and  carriages  of  the  imprisoned  mortal  he 
cuts  li.rge  windows  which  look  out  upon  the  boundless.  March- 
ing up  to  these  windows,  the  mind,  rising  in  even  rags  from  a 
bed  of  straw,  gazes  sweetly  out  into  all  that  is  measureless. 

To  the  common,  prosy,  sleeping  eye  only  a  few  unimportant 
things  are  visible.  It  stands  so  close  to  its  candle  that  it  is 
oblivious  of  the  sun.  A  few  houses,  a  few  feet  of  railway,  a 
piece  of  a  street,  and  a  few  policemen  a^e  in  sight,  but  before 
the  spiritual  vision  there  lie  empires,  arts,  governments,  indus- 
tries, wonderful  men  and  women,  gold  for  labor,  and  laurels  for 
poetry  and  learning  and  eloquence.  When  the  physical  senses 
of  a  humble  German  cottager  fell  into  a  sweet  sleep,  suddenly 
the  inner  faculties  of  his  mind  began  to  multiply  the  cottage  by 
millions.  The  thatched  roof  rose  grandly  into  great  slate- 
covered  rafters,  the  square  holes  through  which  a  little  light 
had  wandered  became  Gothic  openings  through  which  a  great 
flood  of  glory  poured;  the  chimney  widened  its  base  and 
became  a  spire  in  whose  far-up  height  rang  softly  a  chime  of 
bells,  his  fire-place  became  an  altar,  and  the  steam  from  his 
boiling  kettle  rolled  up  as  delicious  incense.  Thus  the  German 
saw  truly  and  grandly.    His  dream  is  a  fragment  of  man's 


X4  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

history,  for  when  the  coarse  outer  sense  makes  room  for  the 
larger  perception  of  the  spiritual  power  the  tangible  realities 
become  only  steps  on  which  the  soul  ascends  to  the  heights. 
The  ideal  is  the  explanation  of  life.  Man  is  an  animal  whose 
world  is  not  under  his  feet  like  the  world  of  the  elephant  and 
the  ox.  but  it  is  far  away  in  the  front.  The  present  and  near 
are  not  his  ocean,  but  only  the  little  water  that  is  under  his 
ship.  Hence  in  journeying  man  always  sits  looking  forward. 
Women  o(  gentle  intellect  and  absorbed  in  fashion  can  ride 
backward,  for  their  sweet  instinct  is  to  keep. dust  out  of  their 
limited  eyes.  In  the  general  man  moves  toward  the  bow  of  the 
vessel,  that  he  may  look  not  at  what  is  behind  him,  but  out 
toward  the  untried  and  unknown.  The  true  human  being 
declines  riding  backward,  not  from  reasons  that  are  physical, 
but  spiritual.     It  makes  man  sick  to  have  his  soul  reversed. 

This  strange  imaginative  property  makes  ideality  the  royal 
faculty  of  the  mind.  Without  this  potency  man  retreats  toward 
the  brute  creation,  with  it  he  threatens  to  become  angelic.  The 
"  ideal  '*  is  an  advance  portrait  of  destiny.  The  future  partly 
discounts  itself  and  becomes  the  now.  A  curious  writer  in  Eng- 
land committed  to  the  form  of  a  small  volume,  thirty  years  ago, 
his  ingenious  thought  that  the  past  scenes  of  our  earth  are  still 
visible  somewhere  to  *some  persons,  to  spirits  or  at  least  to 
Deity,  for  if  light  journeys  only  two  hundred  thousand  miles  in 
a  second,  there  are  fixed  stars  so  remote  that  the  light  flung 
back  from  the  men  building  the  pyramids,  or  from  the  waters 
which  rocked  the  "  happy  family  "  in  the  ark,  is  just  now  reach- 
ing those  beings  gazing  down  from  those  orbs.  Events  present 
here  six  thousand  years  ago  are  thus  just  transpiring  elsewhere, 
and  from  some  much  nearer  star  might  now  be  seen  the  battle 
of  Salamis,  or  the  death  of  Jesus  Christ.  From  this  little  essay, 
out  of  which  Froude  perhaps  borrowed  the  fancy,  without  con- 
fession, in  his  paper  on  *'  History  as  a  Science,"  it  may  be  infer- 
red that  as  the  Creator  has  made  a  universe  in  which  the  by- 
gone days  are  following  the  human  race,  to  be  seen  again,  per- 


BEYOND.  15 

haps,  when  the  soul  can  fly  from  star  to  star,  so  it  is  possible 
that  what  is  called  the  idealis  only  a  gentle  smiting,  upon  the 
spirit,  of  light  from  the  infinite  future^ — that  other  hemisphere 
of  the  now.  At  least,  the  imagination  is  the  one  faculty  that 
binds  humanity  to  the  future,  and  which  thus  widens  the  little 
stream  of  time  into  an  ocean. 

In  its  ardent  work  this  creative  energy  will  often  make  mis- 
takes. In  its  childhood  its  blunders  are  many,  and  sometimes 
serious.  The  rustle  of  its  own  footsteps  will  often  be  misunder- 
stood by  a  child,  and  will  seem  the  tread  of  an  angry  giant,  as  the 
noise  of  one's  own  blood  heard  in  a  shell  will  seem  the  old  roar- 
ing of  the  sea.  A  tea-cup  held  to  the  ear  will  dispel  the  dream 
forever.  Not  knowing  the  habit  of  the  mind  to  throw  itself 
outward  into  the  beyond,  primitive  man  transformed  his  sensa- 
tions into  external  entities,  and  out  of  his  longings  made  incar- 
nations. When  the  brave  men  before  Homer  felt  the  pulse  beat 
with  courage,  and  their  souls  to  be  full  of  war,  they  mistook 
this  inner  roaring  for  tde  sound  of  a  far-off  sea,  and  soon  be- 
lieved in  a  Hercules  catching  a  wild  lion  and  performing  other 
tremendous  labors  without  fatigue.  They  expected  daily  to 
meet  the  strong  man,  or  some  one  of  his  sons,  in  some  gloomy 
wood  or  mountain  shadow.  When  the  primitive  woman  be- 
gan to  believe  in  physical  and  spiritual  beauty  she  innocently 
began  to  suspect  it  was  beyond  and  above  her  particular  self  and 
race,  and  as  little  children  cause  their  fears  to  become  external, 
and  hear  .them  moving  in  closets  or  letting  fall  mysterious  foot- 
steps on  the  back-stairs,  so  the  early  woman  created"  an  outer 
form,  and  called  it  Diana,  or  Venus,  and  felt  that  the  Tale  of 
Tempe  was  full  of  womanly  beauty  and  dance  and  music  far  be- 
yond all  that  was  human.  The  swarm  of  larger  and  smaller 
divinities  which  fill  now  the  dead  books  of  mythology  camfe 
from  one  of  the  blunders  of  this  telescopic  vision  of  the  soul; 
and  after  all  this  error  was  not  very  harmful,  for  it  were  better 
for  the  human  race  to  imagine  greatness  to  be  in  a  Hercules  and 
an  Apollo  and  a  Jupiter  than  not  to  be  fully  persuaded  of  £• 


16  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

merit  far  beyond  that  already  attained  by  itself;  better  for 
woman  to  fabricate  a  Diana  and 'a  Venus  and  a  Minerva  than 
not  to  have  dreams  of  her  oVn  sweet  and  infinite  possibilities. 
Heroism  grew  as  much  by  the  help  of  Hercules  as  by  the  phi- 
losophy of  Socrates,  as  long  as  the  man  of  ten  labors  was  an  as- 
sumed reality.  Mythology  was  a  rather  harmless  mistake  for  the 
times  where  it  dwelt.  Had  the  ancients  possessed  only  one  god, 
he  would  have  been  a  poor  little  god  after  all,  for  oneness  does 
not  involve  quality ;  for  were  all  the  reptiles  combined  into  one, 
that  one  would  not  be  a  dove,  nor  a  nightingale,  but  only  a  big 
snake.  It  was  not  the  unity  of  Deity  that  marked  the  necessary 
reform  of  religion,  but  the  improved  quality  of  the  thing  uni- 
fied. The  Mohammedans  had  but  one  god,  but  the  bones  of 
slaughtered  millions  remind  us  that  better  than  that  one  was 
that  group  of  celestials  which  in  the  age  of  Pericles  sipped  am- 
brosia on  Olympus. 

The  gradual  progress  of  the  human  mind  has  corrected  many 
of  the  errors  of  this  stupendous  spiritual  vision.  Colors  are  now 
poured  back  upon  the  soul  which  were  once  poured  out  into 
the  woods  to  make  a  nymph  or  an  Aphrodite.  Society  reclaims 
its  stolen  goods,  and  makes  a  Beatrice  or  a  DeStael  or  a  Reca- 
mier.  The  mythological  world  is  plundered,  and  out  of  its  mar- 
bles we  build  up  Madonnas  and  Evangel ines  and  Luciles.  The 
Hercules  has  thrown  away  his  club  to  be  simply  a  Prince  of 
Orange  or  a  Wellington,  and  the  beautiful  Cytherea  has  come 
in  from  the  mirror-fountains  to  dwell  henceforth  in  the  spirit  of 
any  cultivated  and  beautiful  woman.  Thus  has  the  heart  of  to- 
day really  overtaken  much  of  the  "  beyond  "  of  yesterday. 

From  this  inner  and  powerful  sense  of  sight  which  has  dis- 
tinguished alwaj^s  man  from  the  kingdom  of  brutes,  and  which 
throws  man  out  of  that  animal  world  surveyed  by  Darwin's 
school,  we  seem  authorized  to  feel  that  there  is  indeed  a  beyond 
for  humanity.  His  development  into  greatness  here  so  comes 
from  such  a  gazing  far  away  from  his  feet,  so  much  of  all  that  is 
good  in  his  literature  and  art  and  personal  character  comes  from 


A    VERMONT  RUSK  IN,  1/ 

this  standing  in  the  bow  of  the  vessel  and  looking  forward  and 
from  his  deep  unwillingness  to  look  back,  that  the  heart  with 
difficulty  rejects  the  conclusion  that  there  must  be  a  God  in  the 
advance  who  is  leading  along  His  children  by  means  of  an  ever- 
increasing  glory-track.  As  the  slow  and  noiseless  flow  of  deep 
rivers  point  out  to  one  far  inland  the  reality  of  the  ocean,- so  this 
long  and  deep  flow  of  the  ideal  sentiment  announces  in  advance 
the  reality  of  a  Supreme  One.  The  ideal  is  the  wake  of  a  great 
ship  that  has  gone  before.  So  perfect,  indeed,  will  be  the  uni- 
verse if  this  is  true,  and  so  imperfect  would  it  appear  if  all 
human  longings  are  to  terminate  in  the  grave,  that  in  this 
emergency,  and  having  a  perfect  freedom  of  choice,  those  may 
well  be  pardoned  who  shall  believe  that  the  imagination  is  a 
prophet  in  the  bosom,  uttering  in  all  times  the  one  rhapsody 
that  man  is  a  true  child  of  destiny — a  destiny  amazing  in  its 
quality  and  duration — a  destiny  not  for  the  race  only,  but  for 
the  individual  heart. 

David  Swing. 


A  VERMONT  RUSKIN. 

There  is  a  little  exhibition  of  pictures  now  being  held  at  No. 
14  Grafton  street,  London,  which  should  not  be  allowed  to  pass 
away  wholly  unnoticed.  It  represents  a  portion  of  the  life- 
work  of  a  man  who  may  be  called,  with  a  fair  approach  to 
accuracy,  the  first  genuine  oil-painter  of  whom  America  has 
been  able  to  boast.  It  speaks  well  for  his  countrymen  that 
they  were  able  to  recognize  in  him  the  artistic  merit  which  is  so 
rare  a  gift,  and  that  Mr.  William  Morris  Hunt's  art  was  univer- 
sally appreciated  throughout  his  native  country  during  his  life- 
time. The  brief  record  of  his  life  given  in  the  preface  to  the 
catalogue  of  the  present  exhibition,  presents  us  with  a  picture 
of  an  artist's  career  as  pleasant  as  it  is  rare,  and  while  making 
all  allowances  for  the  omission  of  the  darker  shades  in  the  pic- 


I8  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ture,  we  acknowledge  reluctantly  that  of  few  painters  can  it  be 
said  that  they  were,  at  the  same  time,  highly  educated  as  youths, 
highly  experienced  in  the  world  as  young  men,  highly  successful 
in  the  art  they  practiced  and  the  friendships  they  gained,  and 
highly  honored  at  the  close  of  their  career  for  their  pictures, 
their  teachings,  and  their  life.  Something,  we  cannot  say  what, 
that  belongs  to  the  artist  temperament  is  generally  found  to 
prevent  either  the  success  sought  for  or  the  respect  that  should 
accompany  it;  or,  if  it  makes  shipwreck  of  neither  fame  nor 
respect,  yet  forms  the  cause  of  disaster  still  more  fatal  to  happi- 
ness, and  spreads  over  reputation  and  honor  a  shadow  of  mor- 
bid sadness  which  admits  of  little  or  no  alleviation.  Healthy 
genius  may  exist,  we  believe  it  has  existed,  but  it  is  certainly 
the  rarest  thing  in  the  world,  and  all  the  conditions  of  modem 
life  seem  to  be  against  its  development.  But  into  this  subject 
we  need  not  enter  here.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  Mr.  Hunt's  genius 
for  art,  such  as  it  was,  was  indubitably  healthy  -and  honest  to 
an  unusual  degree;  judging  from  his  pictures  and  his  instrua- 
tions  to  his  pupils  (the  latter  of  which  were  reviewed  two  years 
since  in  these  columns,  under  the  title  of  "Talks  kbout  Art"), 
no  man  possessed  a  saner  mind  in  a  saner  body,  no  man  knew 
more  clearly  that  art  was  not  rightly  the  offspring  of  diseased 
imaginations  and  secluded  lives,  but  a  free,  healthy  growth  from 
the  skill  and  knowledge  of  free  and  healthy  men.  One  sen- 
tence of  his  expresses  this  sentiment  as  clearly  and  as  concisely 
as  heart  could  wish,  for  it  could  hardly  be  put  into  better  and 
clearer  words  than  "  Paint  firm,  and  be  joIlJ^" — an  aphorism 
which  might  be  recommended  with  great  advantage,  not  to  the 
preraphaelites  alone,  or  indeed  chiefly,  but  to  that  class  of 
young  artists  who  have  somehow  succeeded  the  preraphael- 
ites, and  arrived  on  preraphaelite  principles  at  a  very  unpre- 
raphaelite  conclusion.  For  assuredly,  the  "worship  of  sorrow" 
was  never  one  of  the  essential  motives  of  the  preraphaelitism, 
which,  indeed,  consisted  in  affirming  the  healthiness  and  beauty 
of  all  things,  rather  than  the  doctrine  that  beauty  an(!  disease. 


A    VERMONT  RUSKIN.  19 

joy  and  hysteria,  were  convertible  terms.  Fancy  the  result  of 
saying  to  one  of  the  beardless  apostles  of  this  latest  artistic  cult, 
"Paint  firm,  and  be  jolly;"  can  you  not  fancy  the  look  of  sad 
surprise  with  which  the  words  would  be  greeted,  if,  indeed,  they 
did  not  prove  to  be  altogether  too  great  a  trial  for  the  sham 
enthusiast,  and  cause  him  to  fade  away  slowly  and  silently,  as  if 
in  the  presence  of  a  veritable  "  Boojum  ?" 

The  great  interest  that  attaches  to  Mr.  Hunt's  pictures  seems 
to  us  to  be  chiefly  due  to  the  fact  that  they  proceeded  from  one  who 
was  practically  the  first  American  teacher  of  art  principles, — 
first,  not  only  in  reputation  and  merit,  but  absolutely  in  point 
of  timp;  for  speaking  roughly,  Mr.  Hunt  may  be  said  to  have 
had  no  predecessors.  To  all  intents  and  purposes,  his  talks 
upon  art  stand  in  the  same  relation  to  American  painting  as  did 
Reynold's  Criticisms  to  English  art,  and  it  would  be  a  most 
interesting  thing  to  compare  the  refined  and  somewhat  courtly 
discourse  of  our  own  countryman,  with  the  terse,  vigorous  sen- 
tences, half  Saxon-English  and  half  New  England  slang,  in  which 
Mr.  Hunt  expressed  his  ideas. 

But  we  have  to  mention  the  pictures  in  this  exhibition,  and 
to  answer  the  great  question  which  always  presents  itself  in 
speaking  of  transatlantic  art, — is  it  original }  First,  let  us  say 
that  in  all  probability  (j"^S^"S  ^y  ^^e  photographs  and  the 
charcoal  drawings  in  this  gallery),  the  finest  pictures  of  Mr. 
Hunt  are  not  represented  here.  Ther^  are  a  few  photographs 
and  about  half-a-dozen  charcoal  studies  of  landscape,  which 
seem  to  show  a  delicacy  of  touch  and  a  truth  of  atmospheric 
effect  which  are  only  to  be  equalled  by  such  men  as  Corot  and 
Daubigny.  On  the  other  hand,  several  of  the  lai^e  oil  land- 
scapes in  the  gallery  are  coarsely  and  indolently  painted,  with 
an  amount  of  hurry  and  slovenliness  very  inconsistent  with  fine 
art.  The  work  is  in  many  places  that  of  a  clever  amateur,  or,  at 
the  best,  of  an  artist  who  thought  anything  he  did  was  *.*good 
enough."  There  is  (if  we  may  use  the  expression)  too  much  of 
the  "Paint  firm,  and  be  jolly"- feeiing  about  the  works;  and  the 


20  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

painter  was  too  easily  "jolly,"  too  carelessly  "firm."  And  for  the 
originality, — ^well,  if  truth  be  strictly  told,  probably  none  of  the 
work  is  original,  but  reflected  from  the  work  of  the  several 
French  masters  whom  Mr.  Hunt  most  admired,  and  with  whom 
he  for  several  years  constantly  associated.  Corot,  Dau bigny, 
and  Millet  are  chiefly  Yesponsible  for  what  ii  good  in  the  land- 
scapes; Delacroix  and  Couture  for  the  style  of  the  figure  and 
genre  pictures.  Into  Couture's  studio  Mr.  Hunt  entered  about 
1846,  and  he  was  already  famous  when  the  Revolution  of  1848 
broke  out.  His  acquaintance  with  Millet  dates  from  1852,  sub- 
sequent to  which  time  he  worked  with  that  painter  at  Fon- 
tainebleau  until  his  return  to  America.  'Without  entering  too 
much  into  technical  criticism  of  Mr.  Hunt's  landscapes,  it  may 
be  said  broadly  that  both  their  faults  and  merits  are  due  to  the 
influence  of  the  great  French  artists  amongst  whom  he  practi- 
cally learnt  his  art.  Mr.  Hunt's  landscapes  are  painted  for  the 
most  part  in  low  keys  of  color,  give  their  c^ief  attention  to  the 
preservation  of  the  general  tone  of  the  picture,  and  habitually 
subordinate  form  to  general  effect.  Positive  color  they  can 
hardly  be  said  to  deal  with  at  all,  their  aim  is  to  give  truly 
the  relation  of  tone  to  tone,  the  truths  of  distance,  light, 
and  shadow;  they  are  not  so  much  pictures  of  this  or  that 
place,  as  they  are  delicate  melodies  suggested  by  the  place  and 
its  appearance  at  a  certain  hour,  touched  off  by  skillful  fingers, 
and  possessing  a  truth  of  their  own,  though  not  the  truth  of 
nature.  The  real  diflSctilty  of  criticising  them,  and  of  the  artists 
from  whose  work  they  had  their  origin,  lies  in  the  fact  that  not 
being  real  in  the  sense  of  accurate  reproductions  of  nature,  they 
are  still  less  ideal  in  the  right  sense  of  t^e  word,  but  are  mix- 
tures of  certain  natural  facts  arbitrarily  selected,  and  certain 
dominant  ways  of  regarding  these  facts.  •  That  Mr.  Hunt  took 
this  method  of  work  from  the  French  artists  with  whom  he 
associated  is  only  too  certain,  and  so  is  the  fact  that  he  could  by 
no  means  decide  which  it  was  of  those  artists  whom  he  would 
make  his  master.    In  the  landscapes  exhibited  here  we  have 


A    VERMONT  RUSKIN,  21 

now  and  then  one  m  the  style  of  Tioyon;  now  one  in  that  of 
Daubigny ;  here  a  Corot,  there  a  Millet,  and  so  on  to  the  end  of 
the  chapter.  It  is  by  no  means,  therefore,  to  be  understood 
that  the  works  are  deliberate  imitations  of  the  -bove  masters; 
it  is  quite  certain,  indeed,  that  Mr.  Hunt  was  quite  unaware  of 
the  similarity,  and  indeed  would  have  denied  it,  as  we  may 
gather  from  the  following  sentence  from  his  "  Talks :"  "  When  I 
left  it,  I  thought,  'The  first  person  who  comes  in  will  say,  "Oh, 
trying  to  paint  like  Corot!" '  I  wasn't  trying  to  paint  like  any 
one;  but  1  know  when  I  look  at  nature  I  thinic  of  Millet, Corot 
Delacroix,  and  sometimes  of  Daubigny."  This  sentence,  in- 
deed, lets  us  into  another  secret  about  Mr.  Hunt — the  secret, 
namely,  that  he  had  no  actual  method  of  work;  he  says  so 
plainly  enough,  in  other  parts  of  the  book,  and  it  is  pretty  clear 
from  the  work  itself.  The  last  word  to  apply  to  it  correctly 
would  be  "  masterly."  It  is  anything  but  that.  Generally  inter- 
esting, often  meritorious,  sometimes  (as  in  the  large  picture  of 
the  "  Falls  of  Niagara")  simply  false  and  bad,  but  never  mas- 
terly—never, that  is,  approaching  a  determined  end,  by  perfectly 
understood  and  unwasted  means. 

We  have  left  ourselves  scarcely  any  space  to  speak  of  Mr. 
Hunt's  figure-painting  and  portraiture,  both  of  which  are  well 
represented  in  this  exhibition,  though  the  examples  are  few  in 
number.  The  portraits  are  strongly,  even  roughly,  painted, 
full  of  vigor,  and  full  of  a  certain  kind  of  penetration,  but 
hardly  satisfactory  either  as  pictures  or  as  puMings  (we  hope 
our  readers  will  observe  the  distinction).  Flesh-painting  proper, 
as  the  old  masters  understood  it  (or  even  as  it  is  understood 
nowadays  by  Henner,  Watts,  and  Millais),  is  scarcely  attempted; 
but  there  is  a  certain  sobriety  and  even  dignity  of  treatment 
which  is  a  rare  quality  in  portraiture,  and  the  flesh  suffers  but 
little  from  the  cold,  gray  shadows  so  common  in  modern 
French  art.  Some  of  the  smaller  figures  are  very  charmingly 
executed,  with  a  rough  delicacy  (like  the  way  a  strong  man 
touches  a  baby),  and  show-  a  kindly  feeling  for  simple  domes- 


22  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ticities,  which  does  not  d^enerate  into  twaddle  about  baby's 
socks  or  Master  Charles's  pony. 

In  conclusion,  we  may  sum  up  the  exhibition  by  saying  that 
it  perhaps  interests  us  more  in  the  painter  who  executed 
the  pictures  than  in  the  pictures  themselves,  for  it  seems  to 
show  "genuine  artistic  genius  struggling,  despite  much  admira- 
tion of  other  men's  work,  to  beat  out  an  individual  path  of  its 
own,  and  only  failing  because  its  possessor  saw  too  clearly  the 
merits  of  too  many  people.  Mr.  Hunt  wanted  to  be  Couture, 
Delacroix,  and  Millet  rolled  into  one,  and  he  ended  by  being — 
and  it  was  no  small  achievement — a  Vermont  Ruskin. 

—  The  Spectator. 


ENGLISH    ORTHOGRAPHY. 

WHAT  CAN  WE  DO  ABOUT  IT? 

It  has  often  been  said  that  the  most  important  invention  ever 
made  is  that  of  alfabetic  writing.  Before  that  invention  men 
used  to  draw  pictures  for  writing,  or  make  other  signs  of  objects 
or  thoughts,  and  there  wer  as  many  different  signs  as  there  wer 
words  in  the  writing.  The  lerned  wer  all  their  lives  leming  to 
read.  It  is  so  now  in  Chinese.  The  invention  of  alfabetic  wri- 
ting consisted  in  writing  signs  for  the  sounds  of  spoken  lan- 
guage. The  elementary  sounds  ar  few  in  any  language,  thirty 
to  fifty  at  most,  and  may  be  lernd  in  a  few  hpurs.  This  saves 
the  labor  of  a  lifetime.  In  Chinese  there  ar  two  languages,  one 
spoken  and  one  written,  with  no  helpful  connection  between 
them ;  each  has  to  be  lernd  by  itself.  Where  the  writing  is  alfa- 
betic there  is  but  one  language,  the  spoken  language...  Writing 
is  only  a  means  of  recording  and  transmitting  it,  and  in  a  wel 
spelt  language  spelling  may  be  lernd  in  a  few  hours. 

In  a-  perfect  alfabet  there  is  one  sign  and  only  one  for  each 


ENGLISH  ORTHOGRAPHY.  23 

dementary  sound.  One  who  Icnows  it  can  tel  at  once  from 
hearing  a  word  exactly  how  to  write  it,  and  from  seeing  a  word 
exactly  how  to  pronounce  it. 

Every  one  knows  that  the  English  spelling  is  not  perfect. 
What  with  having  been  mixt  up  by  Saxon,  Norman,  and  •  the 
Dane  in  the  first  place,  and  mixf  in  with  Latin,  Greek,  Welsh, 
Hebrew,  French,  and  a  sprinkling  of  words  from  all  the  rest  of 
mankind,  what  with  having  been  put  in  print  by  Dutch  print-  • 
ers,  and  having  been  the  sport  of  pedagogs,  and  professors  of 
Latin  and  Greek,  and  printers*  boys  for  generations,  while  great 
changes  of  pronunciation  wer  taking  place  all  thru  it,  upsetting 
the  whole  gamut  of  vowel  sounds,  we  hav  reacht  at  last  the 
worst  spelling  in  the  world.  One  can  never  tel  in  English  how 
to  write  a  word  from  hearing  it,  or  how  to  pronounce  a  word 
from  seeing  it  written.  The  written  language  is  in  many  respects 
a  diflferent  language  from  the  spoken.  It  represents  the  lan- 
guage of  some  past  generation,  or  some  foren  nation,  and  must 
be  lernd,  each  word  by  itself,  with  little  help  from  the  sounds. 
We  make  a  very  fair  approach  in  complexity  and  difficulty  to 
the  Chinese. 

Our  people  hav  been  fond  of  this  spelling,  or  at  least  proud 
of  it.  Is  there  not  something  that  may  wel  stimulate  honora- 
ble pride  in  having  a  spelling  that  cannot  be  spelt  without  know- 
ing Latin,  Greek  and  French,  and  Anglo-Saxon,  and  a  leash  of 
other  tungs  ?  But  since  the  science  of  language  has  cum  into 
being  and  the  English  language  has  really  becum  a  subject  oi 
scientific  study,  and  the  lerned  spelling  is  found  to  be  mostly  a 
hubbub  of  blunders,  the  time  spent  in  lerning  it  is  seen  to  be 
absurd  waste  for  the  literary  class,  and  wicked  robbery  of  the 
scant  school  time  of  the  people. 

Within  the  last  ten  years  this  matter  has  been  very  fully 
shown  up. '  The  lingMistic  scholars  in  whose  specialty  our  spell- 
ing lies  hav  spoken  out  very  freely  in  reprobation  and  objurga- 
tion of  it.  It  is  in  fact,  among  foren  scholars  as  well  as  our 
own,  the  opprobrium  of  English  scholarship.     Illiteracy  is  also 


24  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

everywhere  recognised  as  one  of  the  most  pressing  clangers  to 
free  institutions,  and  to  Christian  living. 

But  what  can  we  do  about  it  ?  The  apparatus  which  is  famil- 
iar to  our  generation  when  any  great  moral  work  is  to  be  done 
has  been  set  in  motion.  Spelling-reform  associations  hav  been 
formd  here  and  in  England. '  Lecturers  ar  in  the  field.  Con- 
ventions, state,  national,  international,  ar  held.  The  press  is 
appeald  to,  and  the  government.  Schemes  of  reform  swarm. 
But  it  is  evident  that  if  the  world  moves  in  the  regular  groovs 
and  we  hav  no  cataclysm,  an  effectual  reform,  such  as  to  giv 
us  a  fairly  spelt  language  like  Gfjrman  or  Spanish,  wil  take  seve- 
ral generations. 

When  this  is  said,  however,  it  is  not  implied  that  nothing  can 
be  done  at  once.  It  is  not  necessary  to  wart  till  everybody  who 
reads  English  is  agreed  to  a  complete  system  before  doing 
anything. 

From  a  publisher's  point  of  view,  in  the  first  place,  as  soon  as 
there  ar  a  sufficient  number  of  persons  altogether  who  wil  buy 
books  in  amended  spelling,  or  take  a  periodical  printed  in  it,  to 
make  a  substantial  and  profitabl  bizness,  the  time  has  cum 
to  establish  a  publishing  house  to  carry  on  this  bizness,  and  to 
establish  reformd  spelling  among  these  buyers.  This  time  has 
already  cum.  Isaac  Pitman  of  Bath,  England,  the  famous 
inventor  of  fonetic  stenografy,  publishes  the  Phonetic  Journal, 
a  weekly  paper  with  a  circulation  of  over  1 2,000.  His  subscribers 
ar  scatterd  all  over  the  world,  but  the  Journal  has  been  publisht 
since  1843,  and-  is  steadily,  if  slowly,  increasing  its  circulation. 
Mr.  Pitman  also  publishes  various  books,  tracts,  charts  and  the 
like,  and  his  bizness  is  one  of  the  great  ones  in  England.  There 
is  also  a  great  fonetic  depot  in  London,  kept  by  Mr.  Fred  Pit- 
man, which  doutless  pays.  A  bizness-man  will  see  at  once 
how  this  bizness  is  to  spred.  As  soon  as  the  buyers  becum 
numerous  enuf,  new  publishing  houses  will  be  started,  pushing 
the  use  of  this  kind  of  printing  with  new  vigor,  making  it  famil* 
iar  to  more  persons,  and  so  giving  rise  to  s;til  new  publishers. 


.   ENGLISH  ORTHOGRAPHY,  2$ 

There  ar,  in  fact,  alredy  many  smaller  establishments,  emulat- 
ing Mr.  Pitman  in  England,  and  there  can  be  little  dout  that 
the  time  is  fully  ripe  for  the  starting  of  an  American  publishing 
house,  if  any  Pitman  is  redy  to  man  it.  Perhaps  no  town  or 
city  would  at  once  support  it,  but  it  would  rapidly  gather  its 
constituency  from  the  whole  country. 

And  one  great  bizncss  coud  hardly  be  bilt  up  before  our 
versatil  publishers  would  all  be  puting  out  a  book  or  two  in 
amended  spelling. 

And  now  what  sort  of  spelling  coud  such  a  publishing  house 
use  ?  What  sort  of  spelling  does  Mr.  Pitman  use  ?  The  answer 
to  this  question  indicates  that  reform  must  be  gradual.  Such  a 
publishiug  house  would  of  course  use,  as  Mi.  Pitman  does,  differ- 
ent kinds  of  spelling  for  different  purposes  ;  matter  intended  for 
enthusiastic  reformers  is  o.ne  thing,  missionary  matter  to  win 
over  opponents  or  interest  the  indifferent  is  quite  another. 
Looking  at  the  printed  matter  from  another  point  of  view,  it 
may  be  seen  to  be  of  three  kinds,  for  scientific  use,  for  sch(5ol 
use,  for  popular  reading.  Our  dictionaries  ar  the  most  familiar 
examples  of  the  first  kind.  They  undertake  to  giv  the  pronun- 
ciation, and  in  order  to  do  it  they  must  hav  a  fonetic  alfabet. 
They  make  one  by  adding  diacritical  marks  to  a  sufficient  num- 
ber of  the  letters.  •  Webster,  for  example,  has  forty  letters  markt 
to  indicate  their  exact  pronunciation.  These  ar  printed  along 
the  bottom  of  each  pair  of  pages  in  the  unabrigd  dictionary. 
Many  other  works  besides  dictionaries  need  to  giv  the  pronun- 
ciation of  occasional  words  or  letters.  Books  of  travel,  geo- 
grafical  manuals,  essays  on  language,  and  the  like,  ar  full  of 
occasions  of  that  kind.  Our  dictionaries  now  use  different  alfa- 
bets,  Worcester  and  Webster  hav  each  to  be  lernt,  and  so  with 
other  books.  Taken  all  together  they  present  such  a  compli- 
cation that  scholars  who  use  a  dictionary  a  dozen  times  a  day 
hav  to  look  at  the  key  every  time  to  make  out  the  sound  in 
doutful  cases.  It  would  be  a  very  great  immediate  gain  if 
some  complete  fonetic  alfabet  wer  agreed  on  for  such  uses. 


26  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

The  National  Association  of  Great  Britain  for  the  promotion 
of  Social  Science  has  had  this  matter  before  them,  and  taken 
action  in  favor  of  an  establisht  scientific  spelling  as  alternativ 
with  and  explanatory  of  the  common  spelling.  No  one  would 
object  to  the  use  of  perfect  fonetic  spelling  for  such  uses  as 
these.  And  this  spelling  is  also  exactly  what  the  radical  reform- 
ers want  to  see  used  at  once  in  everything  they  read.  Newspa- 
pers and  other  works  printed,  specially  for  them  may  at  once  be 
printed  in  this  way.  The  number  of  readers  is  now  small,  but 
most  of  them  ar  strong  in  faith,  and  believ  the  only  mode  of 
progress  is  to  hold  up  the  perfect  standard  and  rally  all  men  to 
it.  We  may  be  sure  when  the  battle  is  won  they  will  hav  no 
dout  who  won  it.  But  perhaps  the  immediate  value  of  this 
kind  of  spelling  is  to  be  found  in  its  being  a  guide  and  stimulus 
to  partial  reform,  rather  than  in  its  power  of  commending  itself 
directly  to  the  majority  for  immediate  adoption. 

Our  present  spelling  has  departed  so  far  from  fonetic  spelling 
that  very  few  readers  recognize  the  words  in  fonetic  spelling 
fast  enuf  to  read  with  plesure.  The  improvements  of  spelling 
hav  been  gradual  heretofore,  and  they  ar  likely  to  be  so  hereaf- 
ter. The  publisher  of  popular  reading,  newspapers,  or  books  of 
general  interest  must  keep  within  the  bounds  of  what  is  easily 
intelligibl.  In  this  field,  therefore,  reform  must  be  gradual, 
and  it  seems  likely  that  here  the  redy  reformers  will  most  suc- 
cessfully initiate  improvements.  The  elders  of  the  present  genera- 
tion remember  the  lively  combats  over  the  words  ending  in  -£wr 
and  'ick  when  Webster  first  gave  his  authority  in  favor  of  -or 
and  -ic,  I  remember  when  the  spelling  music  first  appeard  in 
the  streets  of  Worcester,  A  new-cumer  in  that  center  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, which  is  the  center  of  the  universe,  put  out  a  sign . 
letterd  music-store.  The  school-boys  used  to  stop  and  spel  it 
with  derisiv  shouts,  and  plaster  the  sign  with  mud-balls  in 
summer  and  snow-balls  in  winter.  But  musick  has  now  gon 
after  Shakespeare's  musigue,  and  the  -our  has  gon  too.  Econ^ 
omy  backt  by  etymology  seemd  to  demand  these  changes.    The 


^  ENGLISH  ORTHOGRAPHY,  2/ 

school-masters  and  the  literary  men,  who  control  the  spelling, 
with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  printers,  knew  that  the  Latin 
mmica  had  no  k  in  it,  and  honor  had  no  u  in  it. 

This  may  teach  us  what  words  ar  most  likely  to  be  changed 
next.  They  ar  words  which  hav  useless  letters  which  ar  wrong 
in  etymology.  The  greater  part  of  these  ar  Anglo-Saxon.  The 
familiar  words  from  Latin  ar  fairly  spelt.  But  fifty  years  ago 
.  the  men  who  knew  Anglo-Saxon  coud  be  counted  on  the  fingers. 
It  was  studied  nowhere  in  England  or  America.  It  was  left  to 
our  orators  and  essay-writers  to  dilate  upon  the  glories  of  the 
mother  tung,  or  grandmother  tung,  of  which  they  knew  not 
one  word.  The  lexicografers  and  professors  of  language  wer 
worse  stiL  They  gave  currency  to  imaginary  derivations  of 
Anglo-Saxon  English  words  from  Latin  and  Greek,  and  mis- 
spelt them  to  perpetuate  their  blunders.  Thus  the  old  English 
//<i«^/ (island),  meaning /a5«^  in  a/«/^r,  was  imagined  to  be  from 
Latin  insula,  and  on  that  baseless  fancy  a  silent  s  was  inserted 
to  preserv  the  memory  of  the  Latin.  The  old  English  rime 
(rhyme)  was  supposed  to  be  from  Greek,  like  rhythm,  and  so 
was  misspelt  into  the  semblance  of  a  Greek  derivativ.  The  old 
sithe  (scythe)  was  thought  to  be  from  the  root  of  Latin  scindo, 
and  was  fixt  irp  accordingly,  with  its  luckless  companions  in  blun- 
dering, scissors  and  scimitar  or  scymetar,  or  however  they  choose 
to  spell  the  old  English  cimeter.  Twig  was  a  good  old  English 
word,  but  our  Latin ists  thought  it  was  a  form  of  the  Latin  ////- 
gtia,  French  langue,  and  they  turnd  it  into  tongue.  An  Anglo- 
Saxon  scholar  cannot  write  such  words  as  these  without  a  pro- 
test. And  the  Anglo-Saxon  scholars  ar  becoming  numerous. 
No  branch  of  study  has  so  grown  in  favor  within  the  last  ten 
years.  There  ar  few,  if  any,  of  our  well-mand  colleges  without 
a  course  in  it,  and  it  is  fast  spreding  in  our  high-schools  and 
academies.  These  etymologies  ar- becoming  part  of  the  com- 
monplaces of  the  school-room.  They  hav  alredy  reacht  the 
popular  dictionaries.  The  new  edition  of  Worcester,  our  great 
conservativ  authority  in  pronunciation  and  spelling,  has  them 


28  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.         f 

faithfully  recorded.  Hand,  for  example,  is  down  in  its  proper 
place,  and  we  ar  told  that  it  is  the  correct  spelling  of  island; 
and  under  island  the  same  statement  is  repeated,  with  the  expla- 
nation that  the  s  has  been  ignorantly  inserted  thru  confusing  it 
with  isle,  from  insula.  So  with  rime  and  sithe  and  others.  It 
seems  impossibl  that  these  blunders  can  hold  their  ground 
much  longer. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  similar  words,  the  disguise  of  which 
is  not  to  be  traced  to  the  Latin  etymologist.  Thus  the  /  of  could 
is  a  modern  insertion  under  the  influence  of  W(mld  Sind  should, 
the  /'s  of  which  come  from  will  and  shalL  The  iv  in  whole  is  a 
pure  blunder,  void  of  malice  aforethought;  but  it  separates  its 
victim  from  the  kindred  hale,  heal,  health,  holy,  and  weakens  the 
significance  of  the  hole  family.  There  is  a  class  of  words  in 
which  an  unfonetic  and  unetymologic  a  has  been  inserted; 
feather,  from  the  old  f ether,  leather,  from  lether,  and  the  like. 
Webster  drew  attention  to  these  and  spelt  them  correctly,  but- 
there  wer  not  ten  Anglo-Saxons  in  America  to  stand  by  him. 
There  ar  some  seventy  common  words  in  which ^«  has  the  sound 
of  short  e,  and  the  spelling  reformers  might  as  well  reform  them 
all  at  once.  Readers  of  old  English  whose  eyes  ar  made  glad  by 
the  pages  of  Chaucer  and  Spen'feer  and  Shakespeare  ar  now 
numerous  enuf  to  make  a  fashion.  There  is  another  habit  of 
the  erly  writing  which  may  well  be  more  extensivly  used,  that 
of  spelling  the  past  tense  and  participle  of  verbs  as  they  ar  pro- 
nounct,  writing  /  final  when  that  is  the  sound.  It  has  always 
been  in  use,  was  once  universal,  and  is  nowagen  becoming  com-* 
mon ;  wisht,  mixt,  kist,  shriekt,  and  the  like,  can  be  used  by  any 
author  without  embarrassing  his  readers.  The  revival  of  good 
old  spellings  commends  itself  indeed  to  literary  artists  and  critics 
of  English  literature  as  an  attractiv  trait.  There  can  be  no  stu- 
dent of  Shakespeare  who  does  not  find  that  Mr.  Furnivars  Intro- 
duction to  the  "  Leopold  Shakspere"  has  a  peculiar  piquancy  and 
keeping  from  his  frequent  happy  use  of  these  forms.  They  ar  a 
saiice  to  his  good  wit,  nor  can  they  be  caviare  to  the  general. 


ENGLISH  ORTHOGRAPHY.  29 

The  interest  in  this  kind  of  reform  is  so  great  that  the  Philo- 
logical Society  of  London  has  been  induced  by  many  appeals  to 
take  up  the  matter  in  ernest  and  appoint  a  committee  to  report 
upon  it.  Mr.  Sweet,  the  well-known  leader  of  Anglo-Saxon 
scholarship  in  England,  has  lately  made  the  report.  The  pam- 
flet  containing  it  is  entitled  "  Partial  Corrections  of  English 
Spellings  recommended  by  the  Philological  Society  for  imme- 
diate adoption."  There  ar  thirty-three  pages  of  it,  made  up 
largely  of  lists  of  words  to  be  amended.  The  great  body  of  the 
amendments  proceed  on  historical  or  etymological  grounds,  such 
as  hav  been  illustrated  in  this  articl.  Most  of  them  consist  in 
the  dropping  of  silent  letters.  Silent  <  is  the  greatest  offender. 
There  ar  something  like  twenty  counts  in  the  indictment  against 
it,  twenty  lists  of  specifications,  some  of  them  long.  The  first 
ar  words  in  which  e  is  fonetically  misleading,  as  being  used  after 
a  short  vowel  and  singl  consonant.  It  is  regularly  an  ortho- 
grafic  expedient  in  such  a  position  to  denote  a  long  vowel ;  have^ 
for  example,  ought  by  good  right  to  rime  with  slave,  rave,  brave, 
grave,  and  the  like;  so  give  should  rime  with  hive,  strive,  alive^ 
The  verb  live  is  wrong  too.  There  ar  hosts  of  such  words: 
fnedicrn,  doctrin,  genuin,  definit,  infinit,  granit,2XiA  so  on.  Then 
there  ar  lists  in  which  an  e  is  simply  useless,  as  the  length  of  the 
preceding  syllable  is  plain  without  it,  as  in  belieite,  grieve,  where 
the  d  if  thong  shows  the  length ;  or  in  carve,  nerve,  where  the 
consonants  ar  a  sufficient  guide.  It  is  advized  to  change  -re  to 
-er,  centre  to  center,  theatre  to  theater^(><W\t.\i  suCh  backing  this 
improvement  wil  no  longer  figure  as  an  Americanism  or  a  Web- 
sterism.  We  ar  to  drop  the  e  of  -le  in  many  words,  assembl,  axl^ 
coupl,  beadl,  and  the  like,  and  in  the  terminations  -able,  -ible,  and 
'tele,  as  in  probabl,  credibl,  articL  It  wil  take  us  a  long  time  to 
get  rid  of  all  these  ^'s. 

Meantime  we  can  b2  going  on  with  other  improvements.  The 
filologists,  or  at  least  Mr.  Sweet,  wil  hav  it  that  for  leopard  and 
jeopardy  the  older  spellings  lepard,  jepardy  shall  be  restored : 
yeoman  should  be  yoman.    The  unhistorical  /  of  parliament 


30  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

should  be  dropt.  The  old  English  ind  old  French  u  should  be 
restord  in  guvern  (gubernator),  munkey,  tung,  wundgr,  wurm, 
and  a  long  list  of  words  now  spelt  with  o.  The  original  /should 
be  restored  in  wimen  (women).  A  long  list  of  words  with  a 
modern  ou  should  go  back  to  their  historic  u :  jurny  (journey), 
dubl  (double),  cuntry,  nurtsh,  and  the  like ;  enough,  rough,  and 
tough  ought  to  be  enuf,  ruf,  titf\  and  through,  ihruh,  or  better 
thru. 

After ^,  u  is  wrong  in  nativ  English  words  1  ike ^^r^T  (guard), 
gardian,  garaniee^  and  so  -ue  in  catalog  (catalogue),  demagogs 
dialog,  harang  (harangue),  and  the  like.  The  report  also  informs 
us  that  words  ending  in  dubl  b,  d,  g,  n,  r,  t,  ar  wrong ;  we 
should  write  eb  (not  ebb^,  so  ad  (not  add),  eg  and  pur  for  egg  and 
purr,  A  great  many  words  derived  from  old  French  and  Anglo- 
Saxon  ar  spelt  incorrectly  with  dubl  consonants  to  make  them 
look  like  Latin  :  a  front  is  spelt  into  affront,  a  fair e  into  affair^ 
a-forthian  into  afford,  a-cursod  into  accursed,  as  tho  they  wer 
compounded  with  Latin  ad- ;  and  the  list  is  long.  A  silent  b  has 
been  added  without  rime  or  reason  to  many  words :  crumb,  limb, 
nunb,  thumb  ;  and  for  a  very  bad  reason  to  a  good  many  more ; 
those,  namely,  in  which  the  Latinists  hav  in  modem  times  in- 
serted it  as  a  reminder  of  the  Latin  word  from  which  it  origi- 
nally came;  dout  (doubt)  and  det  (debt),  for  exampl,  had  lost 
the  b  of  the  Latin  dubit-o  and  debit-  in  the  French  from  which 
the  old  English  came;  doubt  and  debt  icr  unhistoric,  since  they 
would  teach  that  we  tbok^them  from  the  Latin  insted  of  the 
French.  Many  times  ch  is  wrong  thru  the  blundering  of  the 
Greeklings :  ahe  is  the  tru  old  spelling  of  ache,  as  Worcester 
takes  care  to  inform  us ;  anher  has  forgotten  its  Greek.  And 
maskerades  as  anchor;  c  for  s  is  common  :  in  cinder,  old  English 
sinder,  fancied  to  be  from  French  cendre  ;  pence,  where  c  is  Jfor 
the  plural  sign  j  /  once,  where  c  is  for  the  genitiv  s,  and  the  like. 

Sovereign  is  another  blunder  of  the  Latinists,  who  imagindiit 
to  be  a  compound  of  regn-o,  to  reign,  insted  of  the  adjeclti? 
superan-us, .  Milton's  sovran  has  plesant  associations,  but  JWIr. 


ENGLISH  ORTHOGRAPHY.  3 1 

Sweet  brands  it  as  "  a  hybrid  Italian  spelling."  He  givs  us  sovretn, 
but  that  is  an  anachronism.  The  >yords  which  in  erly  English 
wer  spelt  -azn  and  -ein  from  French  -ain  hav  either  taken  am 
exclusively,  which  is  the  common  fact,  or  -^;?.  as  citizen^  denizen, 
dozen,  sudden,  or  -an,  as  human.  The  best  historical  spelling  is 
soveren.  So  faren  (foreign).  Another  trublsum  intruder  is 
gh ;  it  is  thrust  in  by  pure  blunder  in  sprightly,  delight,  and 
haughty,  in  old  times  spritely,  delite,  and  hauty;  and  it  is  a  mod- 
em variation  of  h  in  many  words  where  both  ar  now  useless ; 
plough,  for  example,  though,  through,  and  thorough,  as  well  as 
daughter,  straight,  weight,  2Si^\h^X\\i^,  Why  should  not  receit 
be  written  as  it  used  to  be,  like  conceit,  deceit,  and  the  like?  So 
far  as  the/  of  recept-us  is  concernd,  it  is  needed  in  one  no  more 
than  in  the  others.  In  tch,t  is  of  no  use;  which  is  as  plain  as 
pitch,  and  the  /  is  unetymolo'gical  in  all  such  words. 

These  ar  specimens  of  the  reform  demanded  if  we  ar  to  hav 
our  language  accurate  in  its  etymology.  Word  by  word  these 
corrections  may  all  be  made  in  popular  print  without  making  it 
unintelligibl  or  even  embarrassing.  It  is  quite  as  likely  that 
the  next  generation  will  see  them  generally  made  as  it  was  that 
our  generation  should  see  so  many  of  Webster's  corrections 
adopted. 

But  if  they  wer  all  adopted,  there  would  stil  remain  the  radi- 
cal and  pervading  inconsistencies  and  complexities  which  neces- 
sarily spring  from  our  imperfect  alfabet.  Our  spelling  would  stil 
be  a  great  hindrance  to  easy  lerning  to  read  and  write.  The 
English-speaking  peopls  would  stil  be  hevily  handicapt  in  the 
race  with  the  Germans  and  most  other  nations. 

The  general  adjustment  of  the  alfabet  must  be  made  in  the 
schools.  It  cannot  be  expected  that  any  generation  who  hav 
lernd  the  present  spelling  wil  adopt  a  radically  refomid  one  for 
their  own  use.  But  they  n^ay  be  willing  to  hav  it  taught  to  their 
children. 

In  this  direction  also  great  progress  has  been  made,  and  more 
is  at  hand.    The  old  methods  of  teaching  beginners  to  read 


32  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

hav  givn  place  in  all  our  better  schools  to  others,  which  in  one 
form  or  another  make  use  of  fonetic  spelling.  Text-books  ar 
prepared  with  modified  letters  which  complete  the  aJabet  and 
serv  as  go-betweens  for  the  new  and  the  old.  Words  ar  spelt 
by  sounds.  Reading  matter  is  prepared  in  which  only  those 
words  ar  used  whose  spelling  is  regular.  By  these  and  other 
helps,  half  the  time  is  saved  which  used  to  be  givn  to  the  begin- 
nings of  reading  and  spelling.  The  generation  taught  in  this 
way  wil  be  redy  to  urge  the  next  to  go  further.  And  so,  by  and 
by,  the  good  time  wil  be  here  when  reading  and  writing  English 

wil  almost  come  by  nature. 

Prof.  F.  A.  March,  LL.D. 


ON   THE   STUDY  OF   HISTORY.* 

I  look  upon  the  establishment  of  this  society  as  a  sign  that 
there  is  in  this  great  town,  just  as  there  might  be  ip  a  capital  or 
a  university,  a  body  of  historical  students  in  the  higher  sense, 
who  feel  that  it  will  be  a  help  toward  their  common  objects  to 
work  in  some  measure  in  common,  and  from  time  to  time  to 
exchange  their  ideas  on  their  common  subjects  of  study.  Now 
it  is  no  small  matter  to  supply  another  proof,  one  among  many, 
that  the  pursuit  of  business  and  the  pursuit  of  knowledge  are 
not  inconsistent.  In  this  last  union  I  have  never  seen  the  won- 
der or  paradox  which  some  people  seem  t6  see  in  it.  It  seems 
to  me  that  we  may  fairly  expect  more  and  better  intellectual 
work  from  those  who  have  something  else  to  do  than  from 
those  who  have  nothing  to  do.  Intellectual  work,  like  all  other 
work,  needs  effort;  it  needs  self-discipline;  it  ^metimes  calls 
on  a  man  to  do  one  thing  when  he  feels  more  inclined  to  do 

*  This  was  read  at  Birmingham,  November  i8, 1880,  as  the  opemng  address  of 
he  president  of  the  newly  formed  Historical  Society. 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  33 

another.  But  surely  the  man  who,  in  the  practice  of  other 
work,  has  gained  the  habit  of  doing  all  these  things,  must  be 
better  able  to  do  them  for  the  sake  of  a  new  object  than  the 
man  who  is  not  in  the  habit  of  doing  any  of  them  at  all.  The 
man  who  is  used  to  map  out  his  time  according  to  rule,  as  I 
suppose  every  man  engaged  in  active  business  must  do,  will  be 
better  able  to  find  some  time  in  each  day  for  int-ellectual  employ- 
ments than  the  man  who  has  no  thought  of  mapping  out  his 
time  at  all,  except  according  to  the  frivolous  demands  of  fashicn. 
You  may  have  indeed  to  overcome  a  certain  temptation  to  neg- 
lect studies  which  do  not  at  once  bring  a  return  in  money.  That 
temptation  indeed  is  so  low  a  one  that  I  should  hardly  have 
affronted  you  by  speaking  of  it,  if  the  temptation  had  not  some- 
times taken  the  shape  of  a  kind  of  philosophical  dogma.  Men 
of  some  reputation  in  the  world  have  gone  about  preaching  the 
doctrine  that  all  studies  are  useless  except  those  which  directly 
tend  to  fill  the  pocket.  And  from  this  premise  they  draw  the 
inference — an  inference  that  I  must  allow  follows  most  logically 
from  the  premise — that  no  studies  can  be  less'  useful  than  those 
which  deal  with  the  events  and  the  languages  of  past  times.  You 
have  all  heard  the  doctrine  that  it  is  loss  of  time  to  concern 
ourselves  with  such  trifling  events  as  the  fight  of  Marathdn,  a 
fight  which  happened  so  long  ago  and  in  which  so  few  people 
were  killed,  when  modern  science  can  at  a  moment's  notice  pro- 
vide a  good  accident  in  the  coal-pit  or  on  the  railway  which 
shall  slay  a  much  greater  number.  That  doctrine  can  hardly 
have  an  agreeable  sound  to  the  votaries  of  physical  science, 
whom  we  historical  students  are  not  in  the  habit  of  looking  on 
as  votaries  of  destruction.  Still  the  doctrine  is  there,  a  doctrine 
put  forth  in  the  honor  of  science  by  one  of  no  small  account  in 
other  subjects  J)esides  science.  I  think  that  your  presence  here 
shows  that  you  do  not  accept  that  doctrine.  It  shows,  I  think, 
that  you  cast  aside  the  philosophy  which  teaches  that  the  vari- 
ous branches  of  knowledge  are  to  be  followed,  either  according 
to  the  number  of  guineas  that  they  can  bring  in  or  according 
L.  M.  8.--2, 


34  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

to  the  number  of  men  that  they  can  slay.  You  will,  I  thiirk, 
on  the  other  hand,  agree  with  me  that  it  is  some  comfort 
that,  if  our  studies  are  not  specially  wealth-bringing,  they  are 
at  least  not  specially  bloodthirsty.  We  have  unluckily  a  good 
deaj  to  do  with  recording  death  and  suffering;  but  we  our- 
selves, in  the  course  of  our  own  studies,  are  never  tempted  to  do 
hurt  to  man  or  beast.  The  accidents  of  the  present  time  lie 
as  much  cut  of  our  control  as  the  battles  of  past  times  which 
are  so  scornfully  compared  with  them.  In  serious  truth,  I  look 
on  the  formation  of  this  society  in  such  a  place  as  Birmingham 
as  one  of  the  best  witnesses  that  historical  study,  though  it  may 
not  immediately  fill  the  pocket,  is  not  an  unpractical  but  a  prac- 
tical study,  not  a  dead  but  a  living  thing.  Your  presence  here 
is,  I  think,  a  witness  that  our  pursuits  are  no  mere  groping  into 
things  of  distant  times  which  have  no  reference  to  present  affairs 
or  present  duties,  but  that  they  are  rather  a  marshaling  of  events 
in  their  due  order  and  relation,  an  unfolding  of  effects  accord- 
ing to  their  causes,  which  at  once  brings  the  past  to  explain  the 
present  and  the  present  to  explain  the  past.  Your  presence  is, 
I  think,  a  witness  that  you  accept  what  is  surely  a  highly  practi- 
cal truth,  that  history  is  simply  past  politics  and  that  politics  are 
simply  present  history. 

Another  thing  I  think  I  may  take  for  granted,  that  we  feel 
sure  enough  of  the  intellectual  dignity  and  the  practical  useful- 
ness of  our  own  subject  to  feel  no  need  to  disparage  or  to  forbid 
any  other  subject,  or  to  put  on  an  attitude  of  the  slightest  hos- 
tility toward  any  other  subject.  Our  subject  is  History ;  but  we 
will  not  write  over  our  door  that  no  natural  science  shall  be 
allowed  within  it.  I  think  we  know  too  well  the  way  in  which 
one  branch  of  knowledge  constantly  stands  in  need  of  some 
other  branch.  We  venture  to  think  that  the  ^tudy  of  natural 
science  may  sometimes  be  glad  of  help  from  the  studies  of  his- 
tory, language,  and  literature.  And  we  know  that  the  studies 
of  history,  language,  and  literature  are  often  glad  of  help 
'rom  the  study  of  natural  science.    I  do  not  think  so  meanly  of 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  35 

any  department  of  genuine  knowledge  as  to  believe  that  it  really 
cannot  set  forth  its  own  merits  without  depreciating  the  merits 
of  some  other  department.  I  cannot  believe  that  it  is  really 
impossible  to  hold  up  the  usefulness  of  one  kind  of  institution 
without  running  down  the  usefulness  of  some  other.  I  cannot 
believe  that  such  an  invidious  necessity  is  really  involved  in  the 
pursuit  of  any  branch  of  knowledge.  If  any  branch  of  knowl- 
edge can  flourish  only  by  depreciating  other  branches,  that  would 
at  once  prove  a  weakness,  an  inferiority,  on  the  part  of  that 
branch  whicTh  I  am  unwilling  to  believe  on  the  part  of  any  genu- 
ine intellectual  pursuit  of  any  kind.  The  fault  must  surely  lie, 
not  in  the  cause,  but  in  the  champion.  The  votary  of  any  branch 
of  knowledge  who  thinks  it  needful  to  depreciate  any  other 
branch  can  surely  not  have  grasped  the  dignity  of  his  own 
branch.  He  must  think,  mistakenly,  I  doubt  not,  that  his  own 
pursuit  has  not  strength  enough,  not  dignity  enough,  to  stand 
by  itself  on  Its  own  merits,  but  that  it  can  flourish  only  if  it 

Bears,  like  the  Turk,  no  brother  near  its  throne. 

We,  on  the  other  hand,  believe  in  the  true  brotherhood  of  sci- 
ences. We  believe  that  he  who  depreciates  any  one  among  them 
does  no  real  honor  to  the  other  which  he  tries  to  exalt.  We 
believe  that  there  is  room  for  all,  side  by  side,  in  an  equal  con- 
federation which  admits  nefther  tyrant  nor  ruling  state,  a  union 
in  which  there  is  no  need  for  Ephraim  to  envy  Judah,  nor  for 
Judah  to  vex  Ephraim.  As  the  range  of  man's  knowledge 
widens,  new  forms  of  study  will  always  be  arising.  Let  the  old 
be  ready  to  welcome  the  new ;  let  the  new  be  ready  to  respect 
the  old.  All  men  will  never  ha^«  the  same  tastes,  the  same  kind 
of  intellectual  gifts ;  one  will  be  always  drawn  to  one  pursuit,  , 
another  to  another.  To  each  man's  mind  his  own  pursuit  must 
seem  in  some  way  better, — more  attractive,  more  useful,  more 
strengthening  to  the  mind, — in  some  way  or  other  better,  than 
any  other.  To  him  doubtless  it  is  better;  he  will  do  better  work 
by  following  the  pursuit  to  which  he  is  called  than  by  attempt- 


30  THE.  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

ing  any  other.  But  let  hinj  remember  that  it  is  only  to  himself 
Xhat  it  is  better;  some  other  pursuit  may,  in  the  same  sense,  be 
as  clearly  better  for  some  other  man.  Let  us  demand  equality, 
but  not  assert  superiority.  We  may  be  tempted  to  boast  that 
our  study  is  the  study  of  man,  while  some  other  studies  deal 
only  with  dead  matter.  But  we  shall  remember  that  the  study 
of  man  constantly  needs  the  study  of  matter  as  an  equal  friend 
and  companion.  We  whose  study  is  political  history,  the  his- 
tory of  mankind  as  members  of  civil  communities,  feel  no  slight 
tie  of  brotherhood  toward  those  who  teach  us  the  history  of 
man's  home  the  earth  before  man  arose  to  take  possession.  We 
feel  that  tie  toward  those  who  teach  us  the  history  of  those 
earlier  forms  of  animal  life  which  came  before  man,  and  against 
which  man  had  often  to  struggle.  We  feel  it  toward  those  who 
teach  us  the  history  of  the  lower  forms  of  man  himself,  and  who 
put  us  in  the  way  of  tracing  the  steps  by  which,  out  of  such  rude 
beginnings,  civil  society  could  shape  itself  into  the  democracy 
of  Athens,  the  kingdom  of  England,  the  federal  commonwealth 
of  America.  We  will  draw  no  public  comparisons  between  our- 
selves and  any  others.  We  may  cherish  among  ourselves  the 
belief  that  in  the  stud}'^  of  man,  in  his  highest  form,  as  the  citi- 
zen of  a  free  commonwealth,  there  is  something  more  bracing, 
more  elevating,  than  in  the  study  of  the  material  universe  itself. 
But  we  will  sa}'  so  only  among  ou^'selves;  we  will  not  blurt  out 
the  doctrine  in  any  company  where  an  astronomer  might  be 
pained  by  hearing  us.  And  we  must  never  forget  that^e  have 
our  thorn  in  the  flesh,  that  we  have  certain  difficulties  to  strug- 
gle against  which,  as  far  as  I  can  see,  do  not  stand  in  the  way  of 
the  votaries  of  other  branche^of  knowledge.  Of  course  I  may 
mistake  our  position  ;  I  may  think  that  we  are  persecuted  when 
we  are  not.  I  remember  some  years  back  how  a  man  eminent 
in  one  of  the  natural  sciences  described  himself  and  his  brethren 
as  an  afflicted  race,  suffering  like  the  Jews  in  tlie  middle  ages. 
To  me  the  description  sounded  a  little  amazing.  I  had  always 
fancied  every  professor  of  any  form  of  natural  science  as  flour- 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  3/ 

isbing  like  a  green  bay-tree.  I  wondered  where  the  persecution 
could  lie,  till  I  considered  the  real  position  of  the  Jew  of  the  middle 
ages.  He  who  compared  the  professors  of  natural  science  to  the 
Jews  of  the  middle  ages  had  clearly  risen  above  the  popular 
view  of  the  Jews  of  the  middle  ages.  He  had  gone  to  original 
sources,  not  to  romance-writers  or  romantic  historians.  He  had 
read  the  annals  of  Saint  Albans  abbey  in  the  Latin  text,  and 
he  knew  that  when  Aaron  the  Jew  went  to  the  abbey  gate  it 
was  he  who  proudly  threatened  the  abbot,  not  the  abbot  who 
proudly  threatened  him.  The  professor  meant  the  mediaeval 
Jew  as  the  mediaeval  Jew  is  described  in  the  writers  of  his  own 
time,  rich,  proud,  feared  of  all,  dwelling  in  houses  like  the  pal- 
aces of  kings.  To  be  sure  these  advantages  had  their  draw- 
backs ;  a  sudden  caprice  of  the  king,  a  sudden  outbreak  of  the 
people,  might  break  down  th^ir  palaces,  might  empty  their' 
money-bags,  might  even  drive  them  homeless  out  of  the  land. 
But  all  this  is  no  more  than  the  nations  of  south-eastern  Europe 
have  to  put  up  with  under  that  paternal  government  which  Brit- 
ish interests  call  upon  us  to  maintain.  One  could  not  therefore 
decently  speak  of  it  as  persecution.  I  was  surely  right  in  think- 
ing that  the  likeness  between  the  natural-science  professor  and 
the  Jew  of  the  middle  ages  was  to  be  found  in  the  normal  pros- 
perity of  the  Jew,  not  in  the  occasional  interferences  with  that 
prosperity.  But  the  professors,  rich  and  prosperous  as  medi- 
aeval Jews,  still  complained  of  being  persecuted.  They  could 
hardly  mean  that  they  were  in  disfavor  on  theological  grounds. 
For  a  persecution  on  theological  grounds,  if  it  does  not  go  the 
full  length  of  stake,  bonds,  or  banishment,  is  surely  what  every 
man  would  wish  for.  Surely  nothing  makes  a  man  so  run  after 
as  to  call  him  a  heretic.  In  our  studies  we  have  not  that  advan- 
tage. It  can  hardly  be  said  that  historical  study,  as  such,  is  of 
any  theological  color.  This  or  that  historian  may,  in  his  own 
person,  be  orthodox,  or  heretical,  or  anything  else,  and  he  may 
flourish  or  suffer  accordingly.  And  the  man  whose  convictions 
lead  him  to  no  extreme  views  in  any  direction,  but  who  is  con- 


,38  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

strained  to  jog  on  in  a  kind  of  moderate,  passive,  tolerant  ortho- 
doxy, is  the  most  unlucky  of  all,  for  he  cannot  persuade  anybody 
on  any  side  to  make  a  victim  of  him.  Natural  science,  on  the 
other  hand,  as  such,  has  sometimes  drawn  on  itself  theological 
censure  and  even  theological  persecution.  Still  I  cannot  think 
that  it  was  of  censure  or  persecution  of  that  kind  that  the  pros- 
perous professor  complained.  For  that  in  our  times  would  doubt- 
less have  been  matter  not  of  complaint,  but  of  rejoicing.  The 
persecution,  as  far  as  I  could  make  out,  consisted  in  the  fact  that  a 
"  vulgar  public"  insisted  on  forming  its  opinion  of  their  doings,  and 
of  judging  them  by  the  laws  by  which  it  judged  those  who  were  not 
professors.  Then,  at  last,  I  could  not  keep  down  a  rising  feeling 
of  envy,  envy  perhaps  unjust,  but  certainly  natural.  I  too  began 
to  feel  persecuted ;  I  began  to  understand  the  feelings  of  a  mar- 
tyr on  behalf  of  myself  and  of  my  suffering  brethren  of  my  own 
studiesi  I  began  to  think  that,  if  me  "  vulgar  public"  was  a  Tra- 
jan to  our  natural-science  friends,  he  was  a  very  Decius  to  us. 
I  did  not  feel  at  all  like  the  Jew  of  the  middle  ages,  dwelling  in 
palaces  and  threatening  lordly  prelates.  It  seemed  to  me  as  if, 
while  our  scientific  brethren  lived  a  life  of  alternate  prosperity 
and  persecution,  it  was  our  lot  to  share  deeply  with  them  in 
their  persecutions,  but  to  have  no  share  in  their  prosperity. 

Now  certainly,  if  the  public  be  vulgar,  and  if  to  be  subjected 
to  the  judgment  of  a  vulgar  public  be  persecution,  the  votaries 
of  historical  knowledge  are  a  sadly  persecuted  race.  It  was  not 
I — it  was  not  any  historical  scholar — who  gave  the  public  the 
epithet  of  "  vulgar ;"  but,  vulgar  or  not  vulgar,  the  public  cer- 
tainly insists  on  judging  us.  And  I,  for  my  part,  do  not  repine 
at  our  fate.  I  do  not  refuse  the  authority  of  the  judge.  I  only 
ask  him  not  to  give  judgment  till  he  has  fairly  heard  counsel 
on  both  sides.  I  only  appeal,  I  do  not  say  from  Philip  drunk 
to  Philip  sober,  biit,  according  to  another  story  of  the  same 
king,  from  Philip  in  a  hurry  to  Philip  when  he  has  really  thought 
matters  over.  Whether  we  like  it  or  not,  we  cannot  get  rid  of 
the  "vulgar  public"  as  the  final  judge  in  all  matters.    We  may 


ON   THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  39 

repine,  under  his  judgments,  we  may  do  what  we  can  to  lead 
him  to  reverse  them  ;  but  we  cannot  depose  him  from  his  judg- 
ment-seat. Whether  we  deem  him  a  "  strong  court "  or  a  weak 
one,  we  cannot  hinder  his  sentences  from  being  carried  out. 
And  this  is  far  more  true  of  us,  students  jDf  history  and  of  sub- 
jects closely  connected  with  history,  than  it  is  of  the  students  of 
most  other  branches  of  knowledge.  The  inevitable  judge  has  a 
higher  sense  of  his  own  qualifications  in  this  case  than  he  has 
in  the  other.  The  vulgar  public — remember  again  that  the  epi- 
thet is  not  of  my  giving — is  ready  to  believe  that  the  astrono- 
mer or  the  chemist  knows  more  than  he  does  himself  about  as- 
tronomy or  chemistry ;  he  is  not  so  ready  to  believe  that  the 
historian  or  the  philologer  knows  more  than  he  does  of  history 
or  philology.  Now  I  will  not  say  that  this  assumption  on  the 
part  of  the  vulgar  public  is  true ;  but  I  do  say  that  it  is  really 
plausible.  I  believe  that  the  truth  lies  the  other  way.  I  be- 
lieve that,  if  we  walk  out  into  the  road,  the  first  man  that  we 
meet  is  far  more  likely  to  have  some  rudimentary  notion,  very 
rudimentary,  very  inadequate,  but  still  right  as  far  as  it  goes,  of 
astronomy  or  some  other  branch  of  natural  science,  than  he  is 
to  have  the  same  kind  of  rudimentary  knowledge  of  history  or 
philology.  If  he  has  any  rudimentary  notion  of  history  or  phi- 
lology, it  is  very  likely  indeed  to  be  a  wrong  notion ;  the  chances 
are  not  only  that  he  has  much  to  learn,  but  that  he  has  a  good 
deal  to  unlearn.  But  this  very  fact  helps  to  prove  my  position. 
The  fact  that  so  many  people  have  some  notions,  but  false  no- 
tions, on  historical  and  philological  matters  is  itself  a  proof  that 
the  general  public — I  will  drop  the  unpleasant  epithet — does 
think  itself  qualified  to  form  judgments  in  history  and  philol- 
ogy somewhat  more  decidedly,  perhaps  somewhat  more  rashly, 
less  perhaps  under  the  guidance  of  competent  teachers,  than 
when  it  forms  its  judgment  in  natural  science.  We  see  this 
every  day  in  the  fact  that  while  any  very  wild  notion  in  natural 
science  is  laughed  to  scorn,  not  only  by  men  of  special  knowl- 
edge but  by  the  public  at  large,  notions  equally  wild  in  histori- 


40  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.      . 

cal  and  philological  matters  are  treated  quite  gravely,  and  are 
called  matters  of  controversy.  Those  who  believe  that  the  sun 
is  only  three  miles  from  tha  earth  are  a  class  which  may  be 
counted  on  our,  fingers,  and  when  they  put  forth  their  doctrine 
they  are  laughed  at,  not  only  by  aistronomers  but  by  the  general 
public.  That  is  to  say,  the  general  public  has  learned  astronomy 
enough  to  see  the  folly  of  the  doctrine  that  the  sun  is  only  three 
miles  from  the  earth.  But  there  is  a  large  body,  which  puts 
forth  a  large  literature,  whose  members  gravely  believe  the  doc- 
trine of  Anglo-Israel,  the  doctrine  that  the  English  nation  is  of 
Hebrew  descent.  This  doctrine. stands  exactly  on  the  same 
scientific  level  as  the  doctrine  that  the  sun  is  three  miles  from 
the  earth ;  it  is  just  as  little  entitled  to  a  serious  answer  as  the 
other  doctrine  is.  But  the  doctrine  of  Anglo-Israel  is  treated  ' 
quite  gravely;  it  is  looked  on  as  a  matter  of  controversy,  a  dif- 
ference of  opinion  ;  an  attempt  to  treat  the  ethnological  folly  as 
the  astronomical  folly  is  treated  would  by  many  be  thought 
cruelly  unfair.  Has  not  the  Anglo-Israelite  as  much  *'  right  to 
his  own  opinion**  as  a  Kemble,  a  Stubbs,  or  a  Waitz?  Thus  the 
general  public  judges  of  our  subjects,  judges  often,  we  think, 
wrongfully,  but  still  judges,  and  judges  with  a  fuller  conviction 
of  its  own  fitness  to  judge  than  it  shows  in  the  case  of  the  natu- 
ral sciences. 

The  truth  is  that  he  who  gives  himself  to  souftd  historical 
study,  and  who  tries  to  make  the  results  of  his  studies  profitable 
to  others,  will  most  likely  have  to  go  through  a  good  deal  of 
something  which  it  would  be  too  strong  a  word  to  call  persecu- 
tion, but  something  which  is  never  exactly  agreeable,  and  which, 
till  one  gets  used  to  it,  is  really  annoyimg.  To  any  one  here 
present  who  is  beginning  to  give  himself  to  real  historical  work 
I  would  say,  as  the  first  precept — dare  to  be  accurate.  You  will 
be  called  a  pedant  for  being  so ;  but  dare  to  be  accurate  all  the 
same.  Remember  that  what  he  who  calls  you  a  pedant  really 
means  is  this.  He  feels  that  you  know  something  which  he 
^oes  not  know;  he  is  ashamed  of  himself  for  not  knowing  it. 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY,  4 1 

and  he  relieves  himself  by  giving  you  a  hard  name.  To  be 
pedantic  in  matters  of  historical  research  is  like  being  sentimen- 
tal in  matters  of  politics ;  it  means  that  you  have  really  gone  to 
the  root  of  the  matter,  and  have  not  merely  skimmed  its  surface. 
You  must  look  forward  to  be  perhaps  overlooked  altogether, 
perliaps  to  be  criticised,  laughed  at,  made  subjects  of  unfair  com- 
parison, by  men  who  have  no  more  claim  to  judge  of  your  work 
than  I  have  to  judge  of  the  work  of  the  chemist  or  the  astrono- 
mer. You  will  have  to  grapple  with  a  state  of  things  in  which 
ever3'body  thinks  himself  qualified  to  write  history,  to  criticise 
history,  and  where  there  is  no  security  that  the  competent  scholar 
will  win  the  public  ear  rather  than  the  empty  pretender.  You 
will  have  to  grapple  with  a  state  of  things  in  which  not  a  few 
will  deem  themselves  wronged  if  you  make  a  single  statement 
which  is  new  to  them,  or  if  you  utter  a  word  of  which  they  do 
not  in  a  moment  grasp  the  meaning.  You  must  be  prepared  for 
criticism  in  which  your  main  subjects,  your  main  discoveries, 
shall  be  wholly  passed  by,  and  in  which  some  trifling  peculiarity 
of  which  you  are  perhaps  yourself  unconscious,  to  which  you  are 
perhaps  wholly  indifferent,  or  to  which  perhaps  you  are  not 
wholly  indifferent,  but  for  which  you  can  give  a  perfectly  good 
reason,  is  picked  out  as  if  it  were  your  main  characteristic^  or 
even  your  main  object.  I  am  here  among  friends,  and  I  may 
make  confessions.  I  once  saw  it  said  of  myself  that  all  that  I 
had  ever  done  was  to  alter  the  spelling  of  the  names  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon  kings.  I  thought  that  I  had  done  something 
else,  and  I  did  not  think  that  I  had  done  that.  I  had  always 
fancied  that,  in  so  trifling  a  matter  as  spelling,  I  had  taken  the 
safe  course  of  following  the  scholars  who  had  gone  before  me. 
But  from  this  piece  of  criticism  I  learned  the  fact  that  it  was  pos- 
sible that  I — that  it  was  possible,  therefore,  that  any  other  man 
— might  be  criticised  by  one  who  had  neither  read  the  writings 
which  he  sat  in  judgment  upon  nor  the  writings  of  earlier 
scholars  to  whom  their  author  looked  up  as  his  masters.  Now 
I  really  think  that  in  all  this  we  have  something  to  go  through 


42  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

which  our  brethren  in  other  branches  of  knowledge  have  not  to 
go  through.  I  have  seen  it  openly  said  that  accuracy  in  his- 
torical statements  does  riot  matter,  provided  only  the  story  is 
prettily  told.  I  do  not  think  that  any  one  would  speak  in  this 
way  of  the  truth  of  statements  in  geometry.  I  do  not  think 
that  a  chemist  who  is  careful  as  to  the  nomenclature  of  his  sci- 
ence is  cailed  a  pedant  for  his  pains.  In  other  branches  of 
knowledge  it  seems  to  me  that  the  experts  judge,  and  that  the 
unlearned  accept  their' judgment.  In  history  it  seems  to  me 
that  the  unlearned  insist  on  judging  fc5r  themselves.  And  mind. 
I  dp  not  wholly  blame  them  for  so  insisting.  Personally  I  might 
wish  that  they  would  let  it  alone.  But  I  fully  admit  that  they 
have  a  plausible  excuse  for  so  doing  in  our  case  which  they  have 
not  in  the  case  of  our  scientific  fellows. 

Now  here  I  have  got  on  a  subject  which  has  been  lately  dealt 
with  by  an  eminent  historical  professor.  I  read  lately  in  one  c  f 
our  chief  periodicals  much  the  same  complaint  that  I  make. 
The  professor  complained  that  the  general  public  will  judge  of 
historical  matters  without  the  knowledge  which  is  needed  to 
qualify  it  to  judge.  The  general  public,  he  said,  has  a  way  of 
accepting  the  pretty  view  rather  than  the  true  view.  I  fully 
accept  his  general  complaint.  Perhaps  I  might  not  accept  all 
his  particular  instances ;  I  certainly  cannot  accept  what  he  seems 
to  propose  as  the  remedy.  I  hope  I  am  not  misrepresenting  the 
professor;  he  used  several  words  which  I  did  not  understand, 
and  I  have  perhaps  not  fully  taken  in  his  meaning.  But  the 
general  conclusion  that  I  drew  from  his  paper  was  that  we  ought 
to  defend  ourselves  against  the  inroads  of  the  general  public  in 
a  way  which  would  certainly  be  self-denying,  but  which,  I  could 
not  help  fearing,  might  also  prove  self-destructive.  I  took  the 
professor's  counsel  to  be  that,  in  order  to  make  sure  of  beinS^ 
judged  by  competent  judges  only,  we  ought  to  make  history  i 
dull  and  unattractive  that  the  general  public  will  not  wish 
meddle  with  it.  Now  this  counsel  I  cannot  accept.  Certainl 
*f  accuracy  and  brilliancy  are  inconsistent,  let  us  have  the  acd 


ON   THE   STUDY  OF  HISTORY,  43 

*racy  and  not  the  brilliancy.  Let  us  by  all  means  be  dull  and 
accurate  rather  than  brilliant  and  inaccurate.  But  surely  no 
such  hard  necessity  is  laid  upon  us.  Surely  a  tale  may  be  viv- 
idly told,  and  at  the  same  time  accurately  told.  Surely  the 
inferences  drawn  frqm  the  tale  may  be  sound  in  point  of  argu^ 
ment,  and  may  yet  be  set  forth  in  language  which  is  pure,  clear, 
and  vigorous.  Now  the  general  public  will  come  and  sit  in 
judgment  upon  us,  whether  we  wish  for  him  or  no.  But  if  we 
try  to  drive  him  away  by  designed  dullness,  he  will  judge  us  only 
from  without,  and  not  judge  us  favorably.  If  we  can  lead  him 
rather  to  judge  us  from  within,  and  to  judge  us  favorably,  we 
shall  surely  have  gained  a  double  point.  If  we  can  combine 
brilliancy  with  accuracy,  we  can  at  once  attract  him  by  our  bril- 
liancy and  instruct  him  by  our  accuracy.  We  shall  thus  have 
won  over  the  mind  of  the  judge  to  our  cause,  and  that  without 
in  any  way  corruptly  leading  him  to  swerve  at  all  from  the 
straight  course  of  justice. 

We  must  then  submit  to  be  judged  by  the  general  public  in  a 
way  in  which  the  votary  of  natural  science  is  not  judged.  The 
general  public  will*  not  humbly  take  things  at  our  hands,  as  he 
takes  them  at  the  hands  of  the  votaries  of  natural  science.  He 
accepts,  in  the  teeth  of  what  seems  to  be  tTie  evidence  of  his 
senses,  the  teaching  of  the  astronomer  which  teaches  him  that 
the  earth  goes  round  the  sun.  But  he  will  not  with  the  like 
humility  accept  the  teaching  of  the  historian,  even  when  the 
evidence  of  his  senses  supports  it.  He  is  loath  to  accept  the 
simple  truth  that  Englishmen  are  Englishmen ;  every  man  has 
a  right  to  his  opinion,  and  he  prefers  the  opinion  that  we  are 
Romans,  that  we  are  Britons,  that  we  are  Jews.  It  is  a  craze,  a 
whim,  a  fad,  something  to  be  pitied  or  laughed  at,  to  maintain 
the  plain  and  obvious  doctrine  that  we  are  ourselves  and  not 
somebody  else.  It  is  not  a  craze,  a  whim,  or  a  fad,  it  is  an  asser- 
tion of  the  gravest  scientific  truth,  to  maintain  the  certainly 
much  less  plain  and  obvious  doctrine  that  the  earth  goes  round 
the  sun.    Now  the  general  public  does  right  in  listening  to  the 


44  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

astronomer;  he  does  wrong  in  not  listening  to  the  historian. 
He  is  right  in  believing  that  astronomy  is  a  science  which  a  man 
cannot  learn  without  study ;  and  in  which  therefore  those  who 
have  not  studied  must  be  satisfied  to  listen  to  those  who  have. 
He  does  wrong  in  his  evident  belief  that  history  is  not  a  science, 
and  that  one  man  has  as  much  right  to  be  listened  to  about  it 
as  another.  But  the  wrong,  though  a  wrong,  is  natural  and,  I 
think,  pardonable.  I  think  that  things  should  be  other  than 
they  are.  I  think  that  the  fact  that  a  man,  after  years  of  dili- 
gent study,  has  come  to  a  certain  conclusion,  that  he  deems  it 
to  be  an  important  conclusion,  and  tries  to  impress  it  upon 
others,  should  be  thought  to  be  at  least  a  passumption  in  favor 
of  that  conclusion.  I  think  it  should  not  be  taken  for  granted, 
as  it  often  is,  that  the  conclusion  is  a  craze,  and  he  who  forms 
it  a  dreamer.  But  I  do  not  ask  for  the  same  implicit  acceptance 
of  what  we  say  which  the  astronomer  may  fairly  ask  for  what  he 
says.  The  nature  of  our  subject  forbids  it.  Our  subject  lies 
open  to  men  in  general  in  a  way  in  which  it  seems  to  me  that 
few  of  the  natural  sciences  lie  open.  We  cannot  draw  the  same 
sharp  line  between  the  learned  and  the  unlearned.  Every  man 
knows  some  history,  even  if  he  knows  it  all  wrong ;  he  cannot 
help,  even  without  any  formal  study  or  teaching,  knowing  a 
little  of  something  that  passes  for  history.  And  from  such  a 
one  up  to  a  Waitz  or  a  Stubbs  the  degrees  are  endless ;  the 
shading  off  from  ignorance  to  knowledge,  from  false  knowledge 
to  true  knowledge,  is  gentle  and  imperceptible.  Then  the  guides 
are  so  many  and  so  diverse;  the  seeming  oracles  speak  with 
such  different  voices.  It  is  so  hard  to  tell  the  true  voice  from 
the  false.  The  wolves  put  on  their  sheep's  clothing  so  very 
skillfully  that  the  sheep  themselves  are  sometimes  tempted  to 
mistake  an  enemy  for  a  brother.  We  can  hardly  blame  the 
general  public  if,  when  those  who  profess  to  be  experts  say  such 
different  things,  it  thinks  it  can  judge  as  well  as  the  experts 
about  a  matter  which  is  as  much  its  own  as  theirs.  For  the 
study  of  history  is  in  truth  the  study  of  ourselves ;  it  is  the  study 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY,  45 

of  man.  And  it  is  the  study  of  the  whole  man ;  it  is  the  study 
of  man  in  his  highest  character,  as  an  actor  in  the  moral  world. 
It  surely  appeals  to  sympathies  more  open  to  the  world  at  large 
than  any  that  can  be  awakened  by  the  motions  of  the  moon  and 
the  planets,  or  by  the  combination  of  sucl;  and  such  gases  and 
fluids.  I  fight  for  a  democratic  equality  among  all  the  sciences ; 
but  I  do  say  that  our  study  is  more  directly  human,  more 
directly  open  to  all  mankind,  than  the  other  studies.  Men  can- 
not help  wishing  to  know  something,  they  cannot  help  knowing 
or  fancying  that  they  know  something,  about  the  land  in  which 
they  live,  about  the  nation  to  which  they  belong,  about  other 
lands  and  nations  of  whose  affairs  they  are  getting  accustomed 
to  hear  more  and  more  constantly  every  day.  The  last  telegram 
from  Dulcigno,  the  last  telegram  from  Ireland,  are  alike  parts 
of  history.  They^are  parts  of  present  history,  and,  as  such,  they 
are  parts  of  past  history.  For  Ihe  phenomena  of  the  present 
are  the  results  of  causes  in  the  past>  and  without  understanding 
the  causes  we  cannot  understand  the  results.  Now  about  things 
like  these  men  will  think,  they  will  judge ;  and,  what  is  more, 
we  wish  them  to  think,  we  wish  them  to  judge.  We  do  not  wish 
to  shut  ourselves  up  in  any  learned  exclusiveness,  and  we  can- 
not do  so  if  we  would.  All  that  we  can  do  is  to  ask  a  public 
that  will  think  and  will  judge  not  to  be  hasty,  not  to  be  unfair, 
in  its  thinking  and  judging.  We  do  not  ask  that  public  to 
accept  any  man  as  an  infallible  oracle,  but  we  do  ask  that  a  con- 
viction is  not  to  be  set  down  as  a  craze  or  a  whim  merely  because, 
it  is  the  result  of  the  devotion  of  a  life  to  a  subject ;  we  do  ask 
that  it  shall  not  be  looked  on  as  a  deadly  wrong  if  things  are 
sometimes  said  or  written  on  which  a  sound  judgment  cannot 
be  passed  ofT-hand,  if  things  are  sometimes  said  which  need  to 
be  turned  over  more  than  once  in  the  mind,  which  may  some- 
times even  involve  the  labor  of  opening  more  than  one  book, 
perhaps  of  turning  to  some  book  written  in  another  land,  in  a 
strange  tongue,  and  in  a  distant  age. 
That  the  general  public  will  have  some  kind  of  history  is 


46  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

shown,  if  by  nothing  else,  by  the  fact  that  the  immediate  ser- 
vant of  the  general  public,  the  special  correspondent,  always 
thinks  it  his  duty  to  purvey  some  kind  of  history.  That  the 
history  which  he  purveys  is  often  of  a  very  wonderful  kind  is 
another  matter.  The  point  is  that  whenev-er"  he  goes  to  any 
place  he  must  send  home  the  history  of  the  place,  and  not  only 
that,  that  he  must  throw  his  history  into  a  learned  and  confident 
shape,  as  if  he  had  known  it  all  his  life.  The  historical  student 
smiles  grimly,  and  wonders  why  a  man  should  go  out  of  his  way 
to  proclaim  his  ignorance  when,  if  he  had  simply  held  his 
tongue,  no  one  would  have  found  it  out.  If  a  man  sails  down 
the  Hadriatic,  he  must  write  the  history  of  every  island  he 
comes  to ;  if  he  jumbles  together  Curzola  and  Corfu,  it  does  not 
greatly  matter;  who  will  know  the  difference?  So,  if  he  goes 
to  a  church  congress  at  Leicester,  he  must  needs  write  the 
early  history  of  Leicester ;  if,  instead  of  this,  he  gives  his  read- 
ers the  early  history  of  Chester,  what  does  it  matter  ?  Who 
will  know  the  difference  ?  Not  many  perhaps  in  either  case ; 
not  so  many  as  there  should  be,  at  all  events  in  the  second  case. 
Now  it  is  not  wonderful  if  a  man  who  is  perhaps  as  qualified  to 
write  the  hfstory  of  either  Curzola  or  Leicester  as  I  am  to  write 
a  treatise  on  the  properties  of  nitrogen  gives  a  very  strange  shape 
to  the  history  either  of  the  Illyrian  island  or  of  the  English 
borough.  The  thing  to  be  noticed  is  that  he  does  it  at  all,  that 
he  seems  to  be  expected  to  do  it  somehow.  It  is  plain  that  the 
general  public  does  expect  to  have  some  kind  of  history  served 
up  to  it ;  but  it  is  equally  plain  that  it  is  not  as  yet  very  particu- 
lar what  kind  of  history  it  gets.  The  general  public  will  have 
some  taste  in  the  matter:  it  will  have  some  voice  in  the  matter. 
Our  business  is  to  improve  its  taste,  to  guide  its  voice,  and  to 
teach  it  to  speak  the  right  way.  In  such  a  work  a  society  like 
ours  may  do  much ;  only  we  must  be  prepared  to  undergo  a 
little  persecution  in  the  work.  Something  of  course  must  be 
said  about  Curzola,  something  about  Leicester.  But  if  any  man 
hints  that  it  makes  some  little  difference  whether  the  long  his- 


ON  THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY,  4/ 

tory  of  Korkyra  went  on  at  Curzola  or  at  Corfu,  whether  the 
victory  of  ^thelfrith  and  the  slaughter  of  the  Bangor  monks 
took  place  at  Leicester  or  at  Chester,  he  must  bear  the  penalty 
of  his  rashness.  No  man  need  fear  to  be  called  a  pedant  because 
he  distinguishes  hydrogen  from  oxygen,  because  he  distinguishes 
Saturn's  ring  from  Jupiter's  belts.  But  he  who  shall  venture  to 
distinguish  between  two  English  boroughs,  between  two  Hadrf- 
atic  islands,  when  the  authorized  caterer  for  the  public  informa- 
tion thinks  good  to  confound  them,  must  be  content  to  bear  the 
terrible  name  of  pedant,  even  if  no  worse  fate  still  is  in  store  for 
him.- 

I  said  earlier  in  this  discourse  that  history  was  the  study  of 
man;  I  said  also  that  history  was  past  politics,  and  that  politics 
were  present  history.  We  thus  claim  for  our  pursuit  that  it  is 
specially  human,  specially  practical.  We  claim  for  it  to  be 
looked  on  as  a  study  by  which  we  learn  what  are  the  workings 
of  man's  nature  as  carried  out  in  political  society.  We  study 
the  experience  of  past  times  in  order  to  draw  from  them  practi- 
cal lessons  for  the  present  and  for  the  future.  We  see  that  the 
course  of  human  affairs  goes  on  according  to  general  laws — I 
must  use  the  word  lawSy  though  the  word  is  both  vague  and 
ambiguous,  till  somebody  gives  me  a  better.  Hut  we  see  that 
those  general  laws  do  not  act  with  all  the  precision  and  -cer- 
tainty of  physical  laws.  We  see  that  men  in  certam  circum- 
stances have  a  tendency  to  act  in  certain  ways  ;  but  we  see  that 
they  do  not  act  in  those  ways  with  quite  the  same  regularity 
with  which  objects  in  the  physical  universe  gravitate  to  their 
center.  We  see  that  those  general  tendencies  are  sometimes 
thwarted,  sometimes  guided,  sometimes  turned  aside.  And  we 
see  that  these  exceptions  to  the  general  course  come  about  in 
more  than  one  v/ay.  Sometimes  they  are  what  we  may  call 
mere  physical  hindrances,  like  the  coming  of  some  other  object 
in  the  way  which  hinders  an  object  from  gravitating  to  its  cen- 
ter.' Thus  we  may  set  it  down  as  an  axiom  that  a  young  state, 
a  liberated  state,  a  people  buoyant  with  all  the  energy  of  a  new 


48     ^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

life,  will  seek  to  extend  their  borders  and  to  find  a  wider  field 
for  the  exercise  of  the  strength  which  they  feel  within  them. 
And  happy  we  might  deem  the  state  of  things  in  which  a  young 
,  and  liberated  state  can  carry  out-  this  irresistible  tendency  of 
growth  without  doing  wrong  to  others.  Happy  we  might  deem 
it  when  such  a  state  has  on  its  border  a  new  and  untrodden 
world,  within  which  each  stage  of  the  growth  of  the  new  power 
wins  new  realms  for  the  higher  life  of  man.  Happy,  too,  we 
might  deem  it  when,  though  the  growth  of  the  new  state  is 
driven  to  take  a  less  peaceful  form,  yet  every  step  of  its  advance 
carries  with  it  the  deliverance  of  brethren  who  still  remain  in 
bondage.  The  working  of  this  rule  stands  forth  in  the  history 
of  states  far  removed  from  one  another  in  time  and  place^  but  in 
all  of  which  the  same  eternal  law  of  human  nature  is  obeyed. 
When  the  European  Greek  had  driven  back  the  Persian,  he 
carried  deliverance  to  the  Greek  of  Asia.  Liberated  Achaia 
grew  into  liberated  Peloponnesos.  The  Three  Lands  grew  into 
the  Eight  Cantons ;  the  Eight  Cantons  grew  into  the  Thirteen. 
The  Seven  Provinces  had  not  the  same  field  for  territorial  exten- 
sion as  the  earlier  federations ;  but  they  too  grew  and  waxed 
mighty  in  other  ways,  mighty  perhaps  l^yond  their  strength, 
too  mighty  for  a  while  to  keep  a  lasting  place  as  a  great  Euro- 
pean power.  So  we  may  now  see  with  our  own  eyes  a  people 
set  free  from  bondage,  eager  to  extend  their  boundaries  in  the 
best  of  ways,  by  receiving  enslaved  brethren  within  the  area  of 
freedom.  But  we  now  see  them  thwarted,  checked,  stopped  in 
their  natural  course,  bidden  to  wait — to  wait  perhaps  till  the 
nature  of  man  shall  be  other  than  it  is.  Here  is  the  natural 
course  of  things  checked  artificially  by  an  external  power.  A 
greater  force  stops  for  awhile  the  force  of  nature,  like  a  mill- 
wheel  or  a  dam  in  the  natural  world.  It  has  often  struck  me 
that  a  great  deal  of  our  high  diplomacy  is  very  much  in  the 
nature  of  mill-wheels  and  dams ;  it  is  art  working  against  nature. 
Now  art  may  be  stronger  than  nature;  it  maybe  wiser  than 
nature;  still  it  is  not  nature,  but  something  idiffferent.    And-art 


ON' THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  49 

will  not  be  wise  if  it  forgets  that,  though  it  may  check  nature, 
it  cannot  destroy  nature,  and  that  nature  may  some  day  prove 
itself  the  stronger.  The  course  of  human  events,  the  feelings 
and  the  actions  of  nations,  are  not  changed  forever  because  a 
dozen  Excellencies  round  a  table  have  set  tbeir  names  to  a 
diplomatic  paper. 

Thus  the  natural  tendencies  of  human  events  may  sometimes 
be  artificially  thwarted  from  without.  They  may  also  be  in 
some  sort  either  thwarted  or  led,  we  might  almost  say  naturally, 
from  within.  A  sound  view  of  history  will  keep  us  on  the  one 
hand  from  what  is  called  hero-worship;  it  will  keep  us  on  the 
other  hand  from  undervaluing  the  real  effect  which  a  single 
great  man  may  have  on  the  course  of  human  events.  The 
course  of  history  is  not  a  mere  game  played  by  a  few  great  men ; 
nor  yet  does  it  run  in  an  inflexible  groove  which  no  single  man 
can  turn  aside.  The  great  man  influences  his  age ;  but  at  the 
same  time  he  is  influenced  by  his  age.  Some  of  the  greatest  of 
men,  as  far  as  their  natural  gifts  went,  have  been  useless  or  mis- 
chievous, because  they  have  been  out  of  gear  with  their  own 
age.  Their  own  age  could  not  receive  them,  and  they  could  not 
make  their  age  other  than  what  it  was.  The  most  useful  kind 
of  great  man  is  he  who  is  just  so  far  in  advance  of  his  age  that 
his  age  can  accept  him  as  its  leader  and  teacher.  Men  of  this 
kind  are  themselves  part  of  the  course  of  events ;  they  guide  it ; 
they  make  it  go  quicker  or  slower:  but  they  do  not  thwart  it. 
Can  we,  for  instance,  overrate  the  ^ain  which  came  to  the  new- 
bom  federation  of  America  by  finding  such  a  man  as  Washing- 
ton ready  made  to  its  hand?  Or  take  men  of  quite  another 
stamp  from  the  Virginian  deliverer.  The  course  of  our  history 
for  the  last  eight  hundred  years  has  been  largely  affected  by  the 
fact  not  only  that  we  underwent  a  foreign  conquest,  but  that 
we  underwent  a  foreign  conquest  of  a  particular  kind,  such  as 
could  be  wrought  only  by  a  man  of  a  particular  kind.  The 
course  of  our  history  for  the  last  three  hundred  years  has  been 
largely  affeaed  by  Uie  faa  that,  when  English  free^m  was  it) 


50  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,     :, 

the  greatest  danger,  England  fell  into  the  hands  of  a  tyrant" 
whose  special  humor  it  was  to  carry  on  his  tyranny  under  the 
forms  of  law.  English  history  could  not  have  been  what  it  has 
been  if  William  the  Conqueror  and  Henry  VIII.  had  been  men 
other  than  what  they  we?re.  One  blushes  to  put  the  two  names 
together.  William  was  great  in  himself,  and  must  have  been 
great  in  anytime  or  place.  Henry,  a  man  not  without  great 
gifts,  but  surely  not  a  great  man,  was  made  important  by  circum- 
stances in  the  time  and  place  in  which  he  lived.  But  each 
influenced  the  course  of  events  by  his  personal  character.  But 
they  influenced  events  only  in  the  sense  of  guiding,  strengthen- 
ing, and  quickening  some  tendencies,  and  keeping  others  back 
for  awhile.  Neither  of  them,  nor  Washington  either,  belong  to 
that  class  of  men  who,  for  good  or  for  evil,  turn  the  world  up- 
side down,  the  great  destroyers  and  the  great  creators  of  history. 
Now  when  w^e  look  in  this  way  on  the  influence  of  the  man 
upon  his  age  and  of  his  age  upon  the  man,  we  shall,  I  think,  be 
led  to  be  cautious,  I  might  say  to  be  charitable,  in  our  judg- 
ment of  past  men  and  past  generations.  There  is  no  such  sure 
sign  of  ignorance,  or  rather  of  something  far  worse  than  mtere 
ignorance,  of  utter  shallowness  of  thought,  than  that  contemp- 
tuous sneering  at  past  times  which  is  sometimes  thought  clever. 
No  rational  man  will  wish  to  go  back  to  any  past  time,  and  it  is 
quite  certain  that  if  he  wishes  to  go  back  he  cannot  do  so.  But 
we  should  remember  that  we  have  received  the  inheritance  of 
past  times  and  of  the  men  of  past  times;  that  if  we  have  ad- 
vanced beyond  them,  it  is  because  they  had  already  advanced 
somewhat ;  if  we  see  further  than  they  did,  it  is  because  we  have 
the  advantage  of  standing  on  their  shoulders.  So  we  hope  that 
future  generations  may  advance  further  than  we  have  advanced, 
that  they  may  see  further  than  we  see,  and  yet  that  they  m^iy 
look  back  upon  us  with  a  remembrance  not  altogether  scorn fiil. 
Blame  any  age,  blame  any  man  in.  any  age,  if  it  can  be  show^ 
that  such  age  or  such  man  really  and  willfully  went  backwan 
But  blame :Jio- age,  no  man,  that  really  went  forward,  metj 


ON   THE  STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  5 1 

because  we  are  tempted  to  think  that  the  forward  course  might 
have  been  speedier.  Blame  no  age,  no  man,  that  really  reformed 
something,  merely  because  something  was  left  for  later  ages  and 
later  men  to  reform.  Such  judgments  are  unfair  to  the  age  or 
the  man  so  judged;  for  every  age  must  be  judged  according  to 
its  own  light  and  its  own  opportunities.  And  such  judgments 
are  also  shallow  in  themselves ;  for  the  work  which  is  done  bit 
by  bit,  as  each  bit  is  specially  needed  to  be  done,  will  be  really 
stronger  and  more  lasting  than  the  work  which  is  turned  out 
spick  and  span,  according  to  some  preconceived  theory.  A  few 
anomalies  here  and  there,  a  few  signs  that  the  work  was  done 
faster  in  one  part  and  slower  in  another,  will  do  no  practical 
harm.  The  house  will  not  thereby  be  the  worse  to  live  in,  and 
it  will  better  tell  the  tale  of  its  own  building.  Here  in  England, 
at  least,  we  ought  to  believe  that  freedom,  civilization,  tolera- 
tion, anything  else  that  we  prize,  is  really  all  the  better  and 
stronger  because  it  has  not  been  cut  out  all  at  once,  but  has 
gll^wn  bit  by  bit  by  the  struggles  of  generation  after  generation. 
And  if  our  use  of  the  two  guides  of  our  studies,  reason  and 
experience,  leads  us  to  gentler  judgments  of  the  past  among  our 
own  and  other  old-standing  nations,  it  may  also  lead  us  to  gen- 
tler judgments  of  the  fresh-born  and  still  struggling  nations  of 
our  own  time.  There  are  those  who  seem  to  think  that  slavery 
is  the  best  school  for  freedom,  who  seem  to  think  that  a  nation 
which  is  just  set  free  may  be  reasonably  expected  to  show  itself 
not  behind,  but  rather  in  advance  of,  those  nations  which  h^ve 
been  working  out  their  freedom  for  ages.  Those  who  have  stud- 
ied the  nature  of  man  in  his  acts  will  perhaps  judge  less  harshly 
if  a  nation  for  which  the  gates  of  the  house  of  bondage  have 
just  been  opened  does  not  at  once  spring  to  this  lofty  standard. 
Those  who  stop  to  think  before  they  speak  will  perhaps  see 
that  when  a  nation  which  was  enslaved  in  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury has  been  set  free  in  the  nineteenth — when  a  nation  has  for 
five  hundred  years  had  everything  to  send  it  backward,  while  we 
have  Ijad  everything  to  send  us  forward  —it  is  really  to  the  credit 


52  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

of  that  nation  if  it  comes  forth  on  the  level  of  England  five  hun- 
dred years  back.  We  cannot  fairly  expect  it  to  come  forth  on  the 
level  of  the  England  of  our  own  day.  It  is  .a  homely  and  an 
obvious  doctrine,  but  one  which  some  minds  seem  to  find  it 
hard  to  take  in,  that  no  man  can  learn  to  swim  without  going 
into  the  water.  In  the  like  sort,  a  nation  cannot  learn  the  vir- 
tues of  freedom  while  it  remains  in  bondage.  Set  it  free,  and  it 
may  at  least  begin  to  try  to  practice  them,  and  it  is  not  to  be  harshly 
judged  if  it  fails  to  practice  them  perfectly  at  first.  And  even  in 
cases  where  bondage  and  slavery  would  be  words  far  too  harsh^ 
our  wider  experience  of  mankind  will  perhaps  teach  us  thaf  men 
are  often  better  pleased,  and  that  it  is  often  better  for  them,  to 
manage  their  own  affairs,  even  if  they  manage  somewhat  clum- 
sily, rather  than  to  have  them  managed  for  them  by  others  in 
some  far  more  clever  way. 

In  all  these  ways  we  claim  that  history  is  a  practical  science — 
a  science  that  teaches  us  lessons  which  are  of  constant  practical 
application  in  the  affairs  of  the  present.  It  is  curious  to  see  hotv 
this  doctrine  is  practically  received.  I  have  often  noticed  the 
different  ways  in  which,  according  to  different  circumstances, 
men  receive  any  argument,  illustration,  or  allusion  drawn  from 
past  history.  Such  arguments,  illustrations,  or  allusions  may 
be  of  widely  different  kinds. ,  One  may  be  of  theclassof  which  we 
have  just  been  speaking ;  it  may  be  a  sound  and  grave  argument, 
from  cause  and  effect.  Under  given  circumstances  a  certain 
result  has  hitherto  commonly  happened ;  it  is  therefore  likely, 
under  like  circumstances,  to  happen  again.  Another  reference 
maybe  a  n&ere  sportive  application  of  a  word  or  a  name,  fairly 
enough  brought  in  to  raise  a  passing  smile,  but  which,  on  the 
face  of  it,  proves  nothing  any  way.  Now  the  mere  jest  is  sure 
to  be  received  with  delight  by  the  side  for  which  it  tells ;  the 
gravest  argument  is  scorned  by  the  side  against  which  it  tells. 
The  argument  from  experience  is  grandly  tossed  aside  as  "sen- 
timentalism"  or  "  antiquarian  rubbish."  It  is  not  that  any  par- 
ticular fault  is  found  with  the  argument ;  it  is  enotigh  that  it  is 


OiV  THE  STUDY  OF  HIStORY.  53 

an  argument  from  fact  and  experience,  ^f  fact  and  experience 
happen  to  tell  the  wrong  way.  But  an  argument  of  exactly  the 
same  kind  is  cried  up  to  the  skies  if  it  happens  to  tell  the  right 
way.  The  practical  argument  from  experience  is,  of  all  argu- 
ments, that  which  is  most  applauded  when  it  tells  on  our  own 
side,  that  which  is  most  scorned  when  it  tells  on  the  other  side, 
i  think  that  this  fact,  on  the  whole,  tells  in  favor  of  arguments 
from  experience  and  analogy.  But  it  also  supplies  some  warn- 
ings. It  may  teach  us  not  to  be  too  hasty  either  in  catching  at 
an  example  or  at  an  analogy  which  seems  at  first  sight  to  tell  for 
us,  or  in  rejecting  one  which  seems  to  tell  against  us.  Let  us 
not  trumpet  forth  the  argument  which  seems  to  tell  for  us  till 
we  have  weighed  it  to  see  whether  it  be  sound  or  not.  And  let 
us  not  hastily  cast  aside  as  "  antiquarian  rubbish"  every  argu- 
ment which  seems  to  tell  against  us.  Let  us  rather  weigh  them 
too,  and  see  what  they  too  are  worth.  I  have  sometimes  been 
able  to  make  good  use  on  my  own  side  of  sayings  which  were 
hurled  at  me  as  arguments  for  the  other  side.^  There  are  true 
analagles  and  false  ones,  analogies  which  are  of  the  highest 
practical  ^^alue  and  analogies  which  may  lead  us  utterly  astray. 
There  is  often  real  likeness,  instructive,  practical  likeness,  amidst 
much  seeming  unlikei^ss;  there  is  often  a  seeming  likeness 
where  the  real  state  of  the  two  cases  is  altogether  different,  and 
where  no  practical  lesson  can  be  drawn.  One  who  has  been 
deep  in  controversy  for  the  last  five  years  has  seen  a  good  many 
real  analogies  scorned,  and  a  good  many  false  analogies  blazed 
abroad  as  practical  arguments.  And  he  may  perhaps  have  been 
led  to  the  conclusion  that  those  who  specially  call  themselves 
practical  men— that  is,  those  who  refuse  to  hearken  to  reason 
and  experience;  those  whose  wisdom  consists  in  living  from  hand 
to  mouth,  and  refusing  to  look  either  behind  or  before ;  those 
who  put  names  and  formulae  in  the  place  of  facts ;  those  who 
see  in  the  world  only  courts  and  diplomatists,  and  whoshuttheir 
eyes  to  the  existence  of  nations — are  exactly  the  men  whose  wisest 
forebodings  have  the  strongest  gift  of  remaining  unfulfilled. 


54        V  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

And  now  it  may  be  asked.  If  we  wish  to  give  our  studies  this 
practical  turn,  if  we  wish  our  examination  of  the  past  to  supply 
us  with  a  real  teaching  of  experience  for  the  present  and  the 
future,  over  what  range  of  time  are  our  researches  to  be  spread  ? 
I  answer,  over  the  whole  range  of  the  history  of  man  as  a  political 
being.  In  other  words,  we  can  acknowledge  no  limit  which 
would  shut  out  any  period  of  the  history  of  Aryan  man  on  Euro- 1 
pean  soil.  Let  Birmingham  set  the  example  which  is  so  deeply 
needed  in  older  seats  of  historical  study.  Let  there  be  one  spot 
where  history  shall  be  studied,  but  Where  the  delusive  words 
"  ancient"  and  **  modern"  shall  never  be  heard.  You  are  not  far 
from  Rugby;  some  echoes  of  the  voice  of  Arnold  may  have 
reached  you.  You  may  have  picked  up  some  fragments  of  the 
teaching  which  that  great  master  put  fdrth  with  so  clear  a  voice, 
but  in  which  he  has  found  so  few  disciples.  To  some  he  lives 
in  his  personal  memory;  to  me  he  lives  only  in  his  writings.' 
But  it  was  from  those  writings  that  I  first  learned  that  history 
was  one,  that  it  could  be  rightly  learned  only  by  casting  aside 
artificial  and  unnatural  distinctions,  and  by  grasping  the  great 
though  simple  truth  that  the  history  of  European  man  is  one 
unbroken  tale.  That  history  is  one  unbroken  series  of  cause 
and  effect,  no  part  of  which  can  be  cightly  understood  if  any 
other  part  is  wholly  shut  out  from  the  survey.  Let  there  be  one 
spot  where  the  vain  formulae  of  "ancient"  and  "modern"  his- 
tory, of  "dead"  and  "living"  languages,  shall  be  forever  un- 
known. Take  in  the  simple  fact  that  the  so-called  "  ancients" 
were  not  beings  of  some  other  order — perhaps  demi-gods  sur- 
rounded by  superhuman  mystery,  perhaps  benighted  savap;es 
who  knew  not  the  art  of  getting  up  good  colliery  accidents,  per- 
haps mere  names  which  seem  to  lie  beyond  the  range  of  human 
interest  of  any  kind — but  that  they  were  men,  men  of  like  pas- 
sions with  ourselves,  capable  of  the  same  faults  and  the  same 
virtues ;  men,  too,  of  kindred  speech,  of  kindred  blood ;  kins- 
men simply  further  removed  in  time  and  place  than  some  other 
kinsmen,  but  whose  deeds  and  sayings  and  writings  iare  as  full 


ON   THE   STUDY  OF  HISTORY,  ,    55 

of  practical  teaching  for  us  as  the  deeds  and  sayings  and  writ- 
ings of  the  men  vfho  trod  our  own  soil.  Before  the  great 
discoveries  of  modern  science — before  that  greatest  of  all  its 
discoveries  which  has  revealed  to  us  the  unity  of  Aryan  speech, 
Aryan  religion,  and  Aryan  political  life — ^the  worn-out  supersti- 
tions about  "ancient"  and  "modern"  ought  to  pass  by  like  the 
specters  of  darkness.  Does  any  of  you  specially  give  his  mind 
to  so-called  "-ancient"  studies,  to  the  study  of  old  Greece  or  of 
old  Italy  ?  Does  any  man  reproach  such  a  one  with  wasting  his 
time  on  studies  which  are  unpractical  because  they  are  "an- 
cient" }  Let  him  answer,  in  the  spirit  of  Arnold,  that  his  studies 
are  pre-eminently  practical  because  they  are  pre-eminently  mod- 
ern. Does  any  man  give  his  mind  specially  to  the  tongues  of 
old  Greece  and  of  old  Italy?  Does  any  man  reproach  him  with 
devoting  himself  to  the  study  of  tongues  which  are  dead  }  Let 
him  answer  in  the  same  spirit,  but  with  a  depth  of  life  and 
knowledge  on  which  men  in  Arnold's  day  had  hardly  entered, 
that  he  gives  his  mind  to  those  tongues  because  they  are  of  all 
tongues  the  most  truly  living.  Grasp  well  the  truth  that  the 
history  of  old  Greece,  of  old  Italy,  is  simply  an  earlier  part  of 
the  same  tale  as  the  history  of  our  own  island.  Grasp  well  the 
truth  that  the  worthies  of  those  older  times,  the  men  who  strove 
for  freedom  at  Athens,  in  Achaia,  and  at  Rome,  were  forerun- 
ners and  fellow-workers  of  the  men  who  have  fought,  and  who 
are  still  fighting,  the  same  battle  among  ourselves.  The  Acta 
'  Sanctorum  of  political  progress  is  imperfect  if  we  leave  out  its 
earliest  chapters.  We  must  remember  PeriklSs  and  Titmole6n, 
Aratos  and  Philopoimen,  Caius  Licinius  and  Tiberius  Gracchus, 
alongside  of  our  Godwines  and  our  Simons,  our  Hampdens 
and  our  Chathams,  our  Washingtons  and  our  Hamiitons.  and 
their  compeers  of  our  own  day  whom  I  will  not  name.  But 
some  one  will  say.  What  can  great  kingdoms,  great  confed- 
erations, under  a  northern  sky,  learn  from  small  city  common- 
wealths under  a  southern  sky  ?  Much  every,  way ;  if  only  this, 
that  we  may  learn  how  many  different  shapes  that  which  is 


56  ■      THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

essentially  the  same  may  take  under  varying  circumstances  of 
time  and  place.  No  fact,  no  period,  in  history  can  exactly  repro- 
duce any  earlier  fact  or  period,  if  only  because  that  fact  or  period 
'  has  already  gone  before  it.  Between  a  great  kingdom  under  a 
northern  sky  and  a  small  commonwealth  under  a  southern  sky 
there  are  many  and  important  differences.  But  there  may  be 
none  the  less  much  essential  likeness,  and  it  is  the  business  of 
historical  science  at  once  to  note  the  differences,  and  to  dig 
through  to  the  likeness  that  underlies  them.  The  range  of  our 
political  vision  becomes  wider  when  the  application  of  the  com- 
parative method  sets  before  us  the  ekkl^sia  of  Athens,  the  comitia 
of  Rome,  as  institutions  not  merely  analogous,  but  absolutely 
the  same  thing,  parts  of  the  same  common  Aryan  heritage,  as 
the  ancient  assemblies  of  our  own  land.  We  carry  on  the  tale 
as  we  see  that  it  is  out  of  those  assemblies  that  our  modern  par- 
liaments, our  modern  courts  of  justice,  our  modern  public  gath-  . 
erings  of  every  kind  have  grown.  And  we  feel, yet  more  the 
unbroken  tie  when  we  mark  that  they  have  all  grown  by  con- 
stant and  endless  changes  of  detail,  but  with  no  break  in  the 
long  succession,  no  moment  when,  as  in  some  other  lands,  one 
kind  of  assembly  was  consciously  set  aside  and  another  kind  of 
assembly  consciously  established  in  its  pl^e.  Our  very  local 
nomenclature  puts  on  a  new  life  if  here  in  Birmingham,  the 
home  of  the  Beormingas,  a  spot  of  conquered  British  soil  bear- 
ing the  name  of  the  Teutonic  gens  which  won  it,  we  remember 
that  we  brought  with  us  from  our  old  homes  a  system  of  politi- 
cal and  family  life  essentially  the  same  as  that  of  Athens  and  of 
Rome.  We  had  our  gentes,  our  curiae,  our  tribes ;  and  they 
have,  like  those  of  the  elder  nations,  left  their  names  on  the  soil 
which  we  made  our  own.  As  a  portion  of  old  Roman  soil  took 
the  name  of  the  great  gens  of  the  Claudii,  so  a  portion  of  Ang- 
lian, of  Mercian,  soil  took  the  name  of  the  gens  of  the  Beormin- 
gas. Only,  while  the  Claudian  gens,  as  a  gens,  remained  far  more 
famous  than  the  local  division  which. bore  the  Claudian  name» 


ON  THE   STUDY  OF  HISTORY.  57 

the  home  of  the  Beormingas  has  certainly  become  far  more 
femous  .than  the  Beormingas  themselves. 

But  some  will  say,  Can  a  man  learn  all  history,  from  the  first 
glimmerings  of  political  history  in  old  Greece  to  the  last  politi- 
cal question  in  our  own  day  ?  I  trow  not,  if  by  learning  is  meant 
mastering  thoroughly  in  detail  from  original  sources.  Life  is  too 
short  for  any  such  unirersal  mastery,  even  if  a  man  gives  his  . 
whole  life  to  studying  history  and  nothing  els6.  Still  less  can 
those  do  so  who  have  many  other  things  to  do  besides  studying 
history.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  when  I  speak  of  learning,  I  do 
not  mean  the  getting  up  a  mere  smattering  of  the  whole  story 
and  knowing  no  part  thoroughly  in  detail.  I  say  this :  Let  each 
historical  student  choose  for  minute  study  some  period  or  peri- 
ods, according  as  his  taste  or  his  objects  may  lead  him.  Let 
those  periods  be  late,  let  them  be  early ;  let  them  be  the  very 
earliest  or  the  very  latest ;  best  of  all,  perhaps,  let  there  be  one 
early  and  one  late.  Let  him  master  such  period  or  periods  thor- 
oughly, minutely,  from  original  sources.  But  let  him,  besides 
this  special  knowledge  of  a  part,  know  well  the  general  outline 
of  the  whole.  Let  him  learn  enough  of  those  parts  of  his- 
tory which  lie  outside  his  own  special  subject  to  put  periods 
and  events  in  their  true  relation  to  one  another.  By  learning 
some  periods  of  history  thoroughly,  minutely,  from  original 
sources,  he  will  gain  a  power  which  will  stand  him  in  good 
stead  even  in  those  periods  which  he  is  driven  to  learn  more 
slightly  from  secondary  sources.  He  will  gain  a  kind  of  tact 
which  will  enable  him  to  judge  which  secondary  sources  may 
be  trusted  and  which  may  not. 

Let  us  for  a  moment  apply  these  doctrines  to  the  great 
question  of  the  day,  the  question  of  the  fate  of  south-eastern 
Europe,  the  question  whfether  the  New  Rome  shall  be  European 
or  Asiatic,  whether  the  church  of  Justinian  shall  be  a  temple  of 
Christendom  or  of  Islam.  It  is  not  my  business  here  to  decide 
for  either  side.     Those  are  questions  on  which  it  would  be 


58  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

unbecoming  in  the  president  of  your  Historical  Society  to  do 
more  than  point  out  facts,  and  to  leave  others  to  draw  infer- 
ences. I  say  only  that,  in  order  to  form  an  opinion  either  way, 
a  man  must  have  some  general  notion  of  the  fact^  of  the  case, 
and  that  the  facts  of  the  case  go  back  a  good  many  centuries. 
I  do  not  set  much  store  by  the  opinion  of  the  man  who  asked 
whether  there  were  any  Christians  in  south-eastern  Europe, 
besides  "  a  few  nomad  tribes."  I  do  not  set  much  store  by  the 
opinion  of  the  man  who  wrote  in  a  book  that  in  the  ninth  cen- 
tury the  Russians  attacked  Constantinople,  but  found  the  Turks 
too  strong  for  them.  Nor  do  I  greatly  value  his  judgment  who 
held  it  for  certain  that  every  British  ship  that  sailed  to  India 
must  pass  under  the  walls  of  Constantinople.  To  understand 
these  matters  we  must  go  a  little  further  than  this.  Nor  will  it 
do  to  go  back  to  times  two  thousand  years  ago,  and  then  to  leap 
from  two  thousand  years  ago  to  our  own  time.  The  nations  of 
south-eastern  Europe  are,  for  good  and  for  evil,  what  the  long 
intermediate  time  has  made  them.  The  greatest  of  all  witnesses 
to  the  unity  of  history  is  the  long-abiding  drama  of  the  Eastern 
power  of  Rome.  I  counseled  you  just  now  not  to  neglect  the 
study  of  the  early  commonwealths  of  Greece;  but  from  the 
early  commonwealths  of  Greece  we  must  go  on.  The  great 
work  of  Greece,  in  the  general  history  of  the  world,  was  to  make 
the  eastern  half  of  the  Roman  world  practically  Greek.  The 
throne  of  the  old  Rome  was  moved  to  a  Greek  city,  and  the  new 
Rome,  the  city  of  Constantine,  became  the  center  at  once  of 
Roman  dominion  and  of  Greek  intellectual  life.  Bear  in  mind, 
how,  for  age  after  age,  Constantinople  stood  as  the  bulwark  of 
Europe  and  of  Christendom,  bearing  up  on  one  side  against  the 
Persian,  the  Saracen,  and  the  Turk,  on  the  other  side  against 
the  Slave,  the  Avar,  and  the  Bulgarian.  Her  Asiatic  rivals 
could  only  remain  as  abiding  enemies,  to  be  driven  back  from 
her  walls  and  her  empire,  till  in  the  end  one  of  them  was  to . 
force  in  his  way  as  a  conqueror  from  without.  The  Persian  and 
the  Saracen  strove  in  vain  for  the  prize;  the  Ottoman  won  it  at 


ON   THE  STUDY  OE  HISTORY.  59 

last,  to  rule  as  an  Asiatic  in  Europe,  to  remain  five  hundred 
years  after  his  landing,  as  much  a  stranger  as  oh  the  day  when 
he  first  came  in.     But  the  European  rivals  could  be  more  or  less 
thoroughly  changed  into  disciples ;  they  could  accept  the  faith, 
they  could  imitate  tjie  models,  they  couid  in  some  cases  adopt 
the  language,  of  the  power  which,  even  in  attacking,  they  rever- 
enced.    In  the  long  and  stirring  tale  of  the  battle  which  Con- 
stantinople waged  for  Europe,  we  see  the  Roman  power  become 
Greek ;  as  it  becomes  more  definitely  Greek,  we  see  the  other 
older  nations  of  the  peninsula,  the  Albanians  and  Roumans,  long 
merged  with  the  Greeks  in  the  general  mass  of  subjects  of  the 
empire,  stand  forth  again  as  distinct  nations,  playing  their  part 
among  the  nations  from  the  eleventh  century  to  the  nineteenth. 
Long  before  this  we  have  seen  the  Slavonic  invaders  of  the 
empire,  half  its  conquerors,  half  its  disciples,  spread  themselves 
over  the  inland  regions  of  the  Balkan  peninsula,  while  the  Greek 
keeps  the  coasts  and  the  islands.    At  last,  step  by  step,  the. 
empire  and  its  European  neighbors  come  under  the  power  of 
the  Asiatic  invader.     The  European  invader  came  to  conquer, 
to  settle,  but  at  the  same  time  to  learn  and  to  imitate.    The 
Asiatic  invader  came  simply  to  destroy.     He  came  neither  to 
merge  himself  in  the  nationality  of  the  conquered  nor  to  win 
over  the  conquered  to  his  nationality,  but  to  abide  for  ages  as  a 
stranger,  holding  the  nations  of  the  land  in  bondage  in  their 
own  land.    At  last  a  time  comes  when  the  enslaved  nations  fee 
a  new  strength,  a  new  call  to  freedom.    This  and  that  part  of 
those  nations,  here  and  there,  throw  off  the  foreign  yoke  ;  they 
set  up  free  and  national  governments  on  their  own  soil,  and  they 
seek  to  extend  the  freedom  which  they  themselves  have  won  to 
their  brethren  who  remain  in  bondage.     Here  are  the  facts,  facts 
which  cannot  be  grasped  except  by  taking  a  somewhat  wider 
view  of  history  than  is  implied  in  the  well-worn  course  of  old 
Greece,  old  Rome,  modern  England,  modern   France.     But,  I 
state  the  facts  only  this  evening.     I  leave  otheis  to  draw  the 
inferences.     Some  deem  that  it  is  for  the  general  good  of  man- 


66  "^HE  LIBRARY  MAGAZIlStE. 

kindj  for  the  special  interest  of  this  island,  that  the  Mussulmffn 
Asiatic  should  reign  over  the  Christian  European,  that  nations 
struggling  to  be  free  should  be  kept  down  as  bondmen  on  their 
own  soil.  Many  deem  that  it  is  a  specially  honorable  and 
patriotic  course,  specially  agreeable  to  the  feelings  and  duties  of 
a  free  people,  to  help  to  keep  them  in  their  bondage.  Some 
think  otherwise.  They  think,  as  the  old  Greek  thought,  that  ^ 
freedom  is  a  brave  thing ;  they  are  led  to  sympathize  with  na- 
tions striving  for  freedom  rather  than  with  the  foreign  oppres- 
sor who  holds  them  under  his  yoke.  They  think  that  to  give 
help  to  the  cause  of  those  struggling  nations  is  in  itself  a  worthy 
work,  that  it  is  a  work  specially  becoming  a  free  people,  that  it 
is  a  work,  above  all,  becoming  a  free  people,  who,  as  they  hold, 
have  promised  to  do  it.  Here  are  two  ways  of  looking  at  a 
great  question,  neither  of  which  ways  is  of  much  value  unless 
it  is  grounded  on  knowledge  of  the  facts.  It  is  not  for  me  to 
say  here  which  inference  is  th'*  right  one.  I  can  say  only,  study 
the  facts  and  judge  for  yourselves. 

Edward  A.  Freeman,  in  The  Fortnightly  Review. 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE  SOUTH. 

Literature,  from  the  earliest  periods,  has  always  centered 
itself  about  great  cities,  great  institutions  of  learning,  great  libra- 
ries, and  powerful  religious  organizations.  The  sacred  books 
of  the  Hebrews  could  only  be  fitly  studied  at  Jerusalem.  .The 
ancient  Greek,  for  whom  the  culture  of  Athens  was  insufficient 
in  his  day,  went  to  Alexandria,  where  he  had  access  to  the  most . 
world-renowned  philosophers  and  to  the  parchments  of  the 
schools.  The  youths  of  Achaia  and  the  outlying  regions  of 
Greece  must  needs  resort  to  the  Academy  and  the  Porch. 
*.mbitious  Ciceros  found  in  Athens  that  fostering  influence  not 


I 


THE  LITERARY  FROJFESSION  IN  THE  SOUIi..   6v- 

afforded  by  the  city  of  the  Caesars.  Horace,  Virgil.  Ovid,  and 
Tibullus  could  only  flourish  under  the  genial  patronage  of  a 
Macaenas  in  the  imperial  center.  And,  to  come  down  to  later 
periods,  the  mediaeval  scholars  sought  Salerno  and  Pisa  and 
Padua ;  the  Gascon  boy  went  up  to  Paris ;  Roger  Ascham  could 
only  find  the  learning  he  needed  at  Cambridge ;  Chaucer  must 
live  in  the  light  of  London ;  the  German  must  leave  his  Swabia 
and  go  to  Leipsic  or  Gottingen. 

When  we  look  at  the  outcome  of  literature,  therefore,  we  find 
little  accomplishment  anywhere  but  in  the  great  centers  of 
wealth  and  power  and  population.  Sophocles  cannot  find  stim- 
ulus enough  to  incite  him  to  the  production  of  his  immortal 
tragedies  in  his  native  Colonus.  Petrarch  must  come  to  Rome 
if  he  would  receive  the  poet's  crown.  Edmund  Spenser  cannot 
please  himself  with  his  "  Faerie  Queen"  at  his  isolated  Irish  Kil- 
colman  Castle.  Shakespeare  must  be  in  the  neighborhood  of 
the  Mitre  Tavern,  the  Globe  Theater, and  his  friend  "rare  Ben" 
in  order  to  do  his  work  aright.  Dr.  Johnson  must  go  up  to 
Grub  street  before  he  can  write  a  book. 

Since  it  is  clear,  then,  that  every  worker,  be  he  brain-toiler  or 
mere  handicraftsman,  must  have  his  tools,  and  that  those  tools 
must  be  within  easy  recch,  we  argue  that  for  the  cultivation  of 
letters,  for  the  profession  of  literature  as  a  trade,  there  must  be 
the  coincidence  of  certain  advantageous  circumstances  in  order 
to  success.  There  must  be  the  incentive  of  critical  and  sympa- 
thetic minds ;  there  must  be  libraries,  vicinage,  the  attrition  of 
society,  booksellers,  publishing  houses,  the  visible  consciousness 
of  literary  demand  anxiously  awaiting  literary  supply.  All  these 
tools  are  as  necessary  to  the  implantation  and  the  cultivation 
and  the  successful  pursuit  of  the  literary  life  as  are  the  pigments 
and  canvas  to  the  painter,  the  chisel  and  marble  to  the  sculptor, 
or  the  rule  and  plane  to  the  carpenter.  Therefore,  there  must  be 
close  population,  the  neighborhood  of  cities,  the  spur  of  con- 
tact, mental  action  and  reaction,  peaceful  leisures,  freedom  from 
petty  exigencies — in  short,  the  felt  presence  of  throbbing  human- 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,      ' 

ity.  "  Cling  to  the  city  and  live  in  her  light,  my  friend !"  writes 
Cicero  to  his  Coelius ;  "  for  those  who  have  abilities,  Rome  is  the 
place."  • 

This,  of  course,  has  special  reference  to  the  pursuit  of  litera- 
ture as  aprofession.  What  encouragement  is  there,  even  for  the 
artisan,  if  there  is  no  patronage  close  at  hand?  Isolate  him, 
lejive  him  without  any  near  him  to  appreciate  his  work,  and  he 
will  lack  the  stimulus  that  would  make  him  a  skillful  workman. 
Cellini  must  carry  his  metal  carvings  to  the  pope  if  he  means 
to  have  the  approval  of  the  great. 

We  do  not  forget  that  much  of  the  world's  grandest  speci- 
mens of  literature  were  never  produced  as  literature.  St.  Ber- 
nard did  not  write  his  moving  Latin  hymns,  that  will  endure  to 
the  end  of  time,  because  he  wanted  to  be  called  a  poet.  Lang- 
dale  produced  '*  Piers  Plowman"  for  other  reasons  than  to  be 
named  the  father  of  English  verse.  Dante  used  his  splendid 
poetic  faculty,  first  of  all,  as  a  two-edged  sword  wherewith  to 
smite  his  enemies.  In  the  great  results  of  the  Reformation,  the 
literature  of  it  was  a  wholly  secondary  matter.  The  barons  who 
drew  up  Magna  Charta  did  not  study  fine  periods.  The  Solemn 
League  and  Covenant,  the  Petition  of  Rights,  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  were  not  framed  with  the  purpose  of  literary 
effect.  And  when  we  remember  how  often  in  the  world's  his- 
tory the  literature  that  has  had  the  least  self-consciousness,  tl^at 
has  had  in  view  only  some  lofty  end,  has  proved  the  most  per- 
fect, even  when  judged  by  the  strict  canons  of  literary  art,  it 
would  seem  as  if  the  modern  test — art  for  art's  sake — did  not 
hold  good.  The  venerable  Bede,  the  scholarly  Alfred,  the 
intrepid  Wycliffe,  had  little  thought  of  the  artistic  quality  of 
their  work  when  they  were  holding  up  their  torches  amid  the 
earlier  Anglican  darkness.  The  old  masters  painted  for  religion's 
s^.ke.  No  moderns  make  such  Madonnas  as  Fra  Angelico's  or 
Raphael's.  When  Madame  Rambouillet  opened  her  salon  in 
Paris,  and  thereby  took  the  initiative  in  the  awakening  of 
French  intellect,  she  did  not  do  it  for  art's  sake.    She  mourned 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE   SOUTH       63^- 

over  the  frivolity  and  folly  of  French  aristocratic  life,  and  only 
sought  thus  to  erect  some  sort  of  breakwater  against  the  deluge 
of  corruption  around  her — not  to  become  the  leader  of  that 
Renaissance  whose  outcome  we  have  in  Corneille,  Moliere,  La 
Rochefoucauld,  Racine,  and  Bossuet. 

Even  in  the  Elizabethan  age  of  letters,  the  great  minds  of 
England  were  wrought  up  to  magnificent  effort  by  other  than 
art's  impulse  or  the  pursuit  of  literature  purely  for  itself.  The 
wonderful  events  of  those  formative  times  stirred  up  all  men's 
souls  to  something  like  an  unnatural  state  of  mental  activity. 
Shakespeare,  no  doubt,  would  have  poured  forth  the  marvelous 
treasures  of  his  genius  under  any  circumstances.  But  although, 
as  our  most  brilliant  of  American  essayists  says,  "  he  built  up 
his  character  as  instinctively  as  a  bird  does  her  nest,"  yet  his 
immediate  surroundings  had  everything  to  do  with  his  accom- 
plished work,  breathing  as  he  did  the  same  air  with  Sidney, 
Spenser,  Raleigh,  and  the  heroes  of  the  Armada's  overthrow. 
This  was  a  pressure  infinitely  outweighing  the  fact  that  his  wife 
and  children  were  to  be  provided  for  at  Shottery,  and  that  he 
had  an  ambition  for  building  "  New  Place." 

After  our  too  long  exordium,  which,  however,  we  deemed 
necessary  to  the  furnishing  of  the  deductions  intended  to  be 
drawn  from  it,  we  come  now  to  consider  the  subject  before  us — 
the  lack,  for  it  almost  amounts  to  that,  of  a  class  devoted  to  the 
profession  of  literature  in  our  Southern  States,  and  the  reasons 
thereof. 

The  two  States  of  the  South  which  have  given  tone  and 
character  to  the  educated  class  above  all  the  others  are  Vir- 
ginia and  South  Carolina.  They  were  the  earliest  settled, 
and  their  after-prestige  has  been  pre-eminent.  Their  first 
colonists  were  the  best  sort  of  English  and  French  emigrants. 
The  pet  colony  of  the  mother-country,  the  Old  Dominion, 
had  almost  always  as  governor  some  royal  and  titled  favor- 
ite, even  down  to  Revolutionary  times.  We  do  not  claim  that 
there  was  any  advantage  in  that— the  reverse,  perhaps :  we 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

only  mention  it  as  a  fact  that  the  status  of  affairs  was  overween- 
ingly  aristocratic  from  the  beginning.  The  younger  sons  of 
noble  English  families  came  over  to  the  new  possessions  to  bet- 
ter their  fortunes  by  scores  and  hundreds.  Sorry  enough  colo- 
nists some  of  them  were,  so  far  as  real  manly  work  was  con- 
cerned. But  at  this  day  to  attempt  to  deny  the  fact  that  the 
preponderating  portion  of  the  early  settlers  were  not  well-born 
people  is  to  fly  in  the  face  of  all  the  records  of  history.  It  only 
needs  to  turn  Bancroft's  pages  and  go  back  to  colonial  days  to 
observe  how  strong,  and  at  times  unmanageable,  the  aristocratic 
element  was.  As  we  write,  a  leading  journal  in  Richmond  is 
giving  up  its  columns  from  week  to  week  to  the  colonial  record 
of  the  genealogies  that  concern  hundreds  of  Virginia  families — 
records  verified  by  incontestable  references  given  in  profusion. 
Therefore,  it  is  not  a  matter  for  ridicule,  as  it  has  come  to  be 
the  fashion  in  some  quarters  to  make  it,  that  the  early  Virginia 
colonists  who  prided  themselves  on  their  good  blood  should 
have  transmitted  the  feeling  to  their  children :  the  absurdity  is, 
for  their  descendants  to  satisfy  themselves  with  the  fact,  and  be 
content  "  to  sup  on  past  recollections." 

So  in  South  Carolina.  The  Huguenots  of  France,  exiled  by 
the  revocation  of  the  Edict,  found  footing  in  the  new  State,  and 
early  give  its  one  important  city  that  pronounced  character  for 
high  breeding,  refinement,  gentle  manners,  and  chivalrous  living 
which  obtained  in  Charleston  in  larger  measure  one  hundred 
years  ago  than  to-day.  There,  also,  the  commingling  of  the 
English  element  was  large.  These  settlers  brought  habits,  tra- 
ditions, and  prejudices  with  them  that  rule  their  descendants  in 
both  these  dominant  States  down  to  this  hour.  They  were 
largely  drawn  from  classes  to  whom  manual  labor  had  never 
been  a  necessity,  nor  the  making  of  their  own  daily  bread  a 
pressure  and  incentive.  They  found  themselves  in  a  land  where 
light  exertion  secured  independence.  The  climate  was  genial, 
and  imposed  no  heavy  burdens  on  them,  as  on  the  inhabitants 
of  the  New  England  and  Middle  States,  where  one  half  the  year 


,.^^.-J 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE  SOUTH       ^^ 

is  taken  up  in  providing  for  the  other  half,  or,  as  a  facetious 
New  Hampshire  friend  once  expressed  it,  "  where  you  prepare 
your  dinner  six  months  before  you  eat  it/'  But  a  brief  period 
elapsed,  too,  before  the  system  of  African  slavery  was  imposed 
upon  the  South  by  the  mother-country — ^a  system  whose  influence 
in  liberating  the  best  Classes  of  citizens  from  the  necessity  of  work 
has  perhaps,  in  the  long  run,  been  far  other  than  a  benefit.  We 
have  no  reasonings  to  bring  forward;  we  merely  note  the  fact. 
A  spirit  of  distas*^e  for  work  of  any  kind  was  the  natural  result  of 
this  condition  of  things,  and  it  too  soon  became  an  inheritance 
which  descended  as  surely  to  the  children  of  the  colonists  as  did 
their  estates  won  from  the  wilderness.  We  do  not  deny  that  a  cer- 
tain physical  and  mental  indolence  thus  induced  has  had  a  hurt- 
ful effect  on  the  Southern  character.  When  the  goad  of  neces- 
sity is  removed,  when  the  incentive  that  leads  men  to  aspire  to 
the  attainment  of  higher  position  is  lacking,  from  the  very  fact 
that  they  are  as  high  as  they  care  to  be.  communities  are  not 
apt  to  trouble  themselves  with  any  sort  of  discipline  that  calls 
for  exertion,  restraint,  and  self-denial. 

The  predominant  tastes  of  the  South  were,  from  the  begin- 
ning, English ;  and  an  Englishman  is  a  rural  animal  to  the  very 
marrow  of  his  bones.  He  endures  cities,  but  his  greed  is  to  live 
on  his  own  land ;  and  if  by  good  luck  the  possession  of  his  fields 
can  but  date  back  (as  it  does  in  the  case  of  multitudes  of  middle- 
class  men  like  Charles  Kingsley)  to  the  Norman  thieves  who 
landed  at  Hastings — "  whom."  as  Emerson  says,  *'  it  took  a  good 
many  generations  to  trim,  comb,  and  perfume  into  gentlemen"— 
so  much  greater  the  pride.  What  Englishman  of  means  chooses 
to  live  in  Liverpool,  or  Birmingham,  or  Manchester,  or  Shef- 
field ?  With  this  engrained  tradition  and  prejudice,  the  first 
settlers  of  Virginia  and  Carolina  paid  little  attention  to  the 
building  of  towns  and  cities ;  and  to  this  day  all  out-and-out 
Southerners  have  a  smothered  contempt  for  what  they  are  pleased 
to  call  the  vulgarity  of  towns.  We  know  multitudes  of  planters 
who  would  feel  stifled  in  a  city,  and  who,  as  a  mere  matter  of 
L.  M.  8.-3 


THE  LIBl^ARY  MAGAZINE, 

preference,  would  rather  have  their  old  wooden  mansions,  with 
their  too  often  rickety  verandahs,  than  a  four-story  brown-stone 
front.  To  own  plantations  so  large  that  the  daily  morning  ride 
over  them  was  a  hearty  day's  exercise,  was  enough  for  the 
masters  of  the  old  regime :  to  have  scor^  oi-  hundreds  of  black 
retainers,  like  feudal  dependents,  around  him,  was  sufficiently 
flattering  to  his  self-importance.  To  such  men  the  narrow 
limits  of  town  and  city  life*were  nothing  but  dwarfing. 

This  mode  of  life,  so  free,  so  independent,  so  allied  to  nature, 
had  disadvantages,  from  which  the  whole  South  suffers  at  this 
moment.  It  separated  influential  families;  it  imposed  sparse 
population ;  it  engendered  a  spirit  of  overweening  self-content ; 
it  tended  to  a  sentiment  of  hurtful  exclusiveness;  it  interfered 
with  public  organizations  for  the  general  good;  it  kept  large 
schools  from  being  established ;  it  discouraged  the  founding  of 
colleges  and  universities  and  hospitals  and  asylums;  it  made 
against  the  creation  of  literary  centers;  it  segregated  the  edu- 
cated and  literary  men,  and  so  rendered  ineffective  an  influence 
which,  if  massed,  might  have  been  powerful.  **Why,"  the 
planter  of  forty  years  ago  would  ask—"  why  take  upon  ourselves 
the  trouble  and  expense  of  founding  universities  when  the  North 
has  Harvard  and  Yale  and  Nassau  Hall  to  which  we  can  send 
our  sons,  who  are  all  the  better  for  this  experience  abroad  ?" 
For,  until  the  slavery  agitation  began  to  take  hold  of  the  public 
mind,  there  was  not  the  slightest  objection  to  sending  boys 
North  for  their  education.  It  was  much  commoner  then  than 
it  now  is  for  our  Northern  academic  youth  to  finish  up  with 
Berlin  and  Bonn.  Look  over  the  old  catalogues  of  various 
Northern  colleges,  and  the  surprise  will  be  to  find  how  largely 
their  students  were  from  the  Southern  States.  The  same  argu- 
ment applied  to  literature.  Even  had  the  disposition  and  abil- 
ity not  been  wanting,  why  should  the  easy-going  South  Caro» 
llnian,  Georgian,  or  Virginian  vex  his  ease  by  writing  books,  or 
printing  magazines,  or  editing  on  any  large  scale  daily  news- 
napers  ?    The  North  had  all  the  appliances  at  hand,  and  codld 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE  SOUTH,       C>J 

do  it  better,  and  would  do  it,  anyhow ;  and  the  idea  of  competi- 
tion was  a  bother.  He  would  not  disturb  his  epicurean  calm 
by  compiling  even  a  spelling-book ;  Noah  Webster  had  done  it. 
That  would  suffice.  William  and  Mary  College  could  not  be 
manned  like  Harvard  or  Yale,  so  why  not  be  content  with  the 
former?  Hampden-Sidney  could  not  compete  with  Princeton, 
so  wbere*s  the  use  of  worry?  Cui  bono?  And  so  they  saun- 
tered on. 

As  to  the  matter  of  teachers,  the  parents  of  Southern  children 
were  wholly  satisfied  to  look  up  the  foreign  product  for  their 
girls  and  boys.  Such  a  thing  as  Southern-born  youths  fitting 
themselves  for  teachers  would  have  seemed  laughable  in  the 
good  old  day.  Large  numbers  of  graduates  of  the  English,  Irish, 
and  Scotch  universities  made  their  way  to  the  South,  ready  to 
exchange  the  product  of  their  brains  for  bread ;  and  a  very  con- 
venient exchange  it  was  thought  to  be.  Hundreds  of  young 
New  England  men  and  women  came  down  seeking  places  as 
tutors  and  governesses ;  and  no  family  of  any  standing  could  be 
found  that  had  not  its  tutor  and  governess  for  their  rising  scions. 
Even  yet  the  custom  has  not  fallen  into  entire  disuse. 

This  isolated  plantation  life,  so  universal  long  ago,  was  a 
real  hindrance  to  mental  activity  and  stimulus  in  the  way  of 
literary  production.  It  is  curious  even  yet  to  look  over  the 
well-preserved,  calf-bound  volumes  of  an  old  plantation  library. 
Ther^  will  be  Clarendon's  History,  the  old  Dramatists,  Milton, 
Jeremy  Taylor,  Smith,  Tillotson,  Addison,  Hume,  with  stray 
copies  of  "  Evelina,"  '*  Pepys's  Diary,  **  Marmion,"  Miss  Austen's 
early  novels,  but  rarely  the  modern  historians  or  novelists,  or 
even  poets.  One  is  far  more  apt  to  find  Pope  than  Tennyson. 
But,  whatever  is  absent,  there  will  be  sure  to  be  books  of  gene- 
alogy, and  some  coj>y  of  "  The  Peerage,"  though  it  be  not  Sir 
Bernard  Burke's.  The  reading  of  these  books  sufficed  for  the 
elegant,  courtly  men  they  recall  their  grandfathers  as  being; 
and  for  the  stately  women,  who  seem  to  put  to  shame  the  degen- 
eracy of  the  dames  of  to-day ;  and  why  not  for^  them  ?    A  pride 


68      .  THE  LIBRARY  MACAZINB, 

and  enthusiasm  for  libraries  made  up  of  the  literature  of  the 
last  forty  years  is  not  common  even  among  the  educated  men 
of  t'iie  South,  exclusive  of  specialists  and  professional  men.  We 
would  be  unjust  to  the  South  if  we  intimated  that  there  has  not 
existed,  and  does  not  now  exist,  among  the  educated  classes  an 
acquaintance  with  current  literature.  It  would  be  hard  to  find 
a  young  lady  who  had  not  read  George  Eliot,  or  a  young  man 
of  education  who  does  not  know  something  of  Darwin  and 
Huxley,  not  to  speak  of  Dickens,  Thackeray,  William  Plack,  or 
Thomas  Hardy.  But,  as  a  general  thing,  modern  books  do  not 
fill  up  the  shelves  of  well-to-do,  old-fashioned  pljwiters. 

Along  with  other  English  characteristics  pertinaciously  clung 
to,  the  love  for  out-door  sports  has  always  been  one  of  the  most 
positive  inheritances.  To  sit  within  the  house  and  pore  over 
books,  instead  of  being  abroad  on  a  fine  horse,  with  a  pack  of 
baying  hounds  at  heel,  has  ever  seemed  to  the  bona-fide  South- 
ern man  a  sort  of  woman's  work.  He  is  apt  to  think,  with  Lord 
Herbert  of  Cherbury,  that  "  if  there  is  a  sight  on  earth  that  God 
looks  down  upon  with  special  pleasure  it  is  a  fine  man  on  a  fine 
horse."  Southerners  are  all  bold  riders.  It  would  not  be  easy 
to  find  a  boy  of  ten  who  could  not  manage  any  animal  you 
would  seat  him  upon.  Hence,  until  the  civil  war  altered  the 
whole  face  of  things,  fox  hunts,  deer  hunts,  bear  hunts  even, 
and  partridge  shooting  were  the  regular  pastimes  of  the  people. 
In  the  region  around  us  still  the  annual  fox  hunts  come  off  as 
regularly  as  October  appears. 

Nevertheless,  throughout  all  our  rural  districts  east  of  the 
Appalachian  chain,  the  sons  of  planters,  as  a  rule,  have  been 
classically  educated.  There  never  has  been  any  lack  of  home- 
born  men  wherewith  to  fill  the  learned  professions  among  us ; 
but,  as  we  have  said  above,  the  spur  of  stimulus  to  active  literary 
labor  has  been  greatly  wanting.  The  thousands  in  the  fJorth  who 
turn  to  letters  as  a  means  of  livelihood  ^ave  heretofore  had  no 
corresponding  class  in  the  South.  We  are  instituting  no  invidi- 
ous comparisons.     Things  have  wholly  changed  in  the  laist 


THE   LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE  SOUTH       69 

twenty  years  ;  and  in  the  trial  of  new  experiences  there  are  many 
no'v  who  would  gladly  be  possessed  of  the  capability  and  self- 
reliance  of  the  young  men  and  women  of  New  En^^land,  who 
not  only  can  help  themselves,  but  provide  by  their  individual 
labor  for  the  sustenance  of  the  home  circle.  A  new  South  must 
grow  up  before  there  can  be  such  a  state  of  things  general 
among  us.  , 

It  may  seem  a  damaging  admission,  and  one  that  smacks  of 
nide  old  times,  to  say  that  it  has  been  a  widespread  feeling 
among  Southern  people  that  the  following  of  literature  as  a  pro- 
fession has  been  considered  just  a  trifle  effeminate.  But  this 
admission  may  as  well  be  made,  for  it  is  true.  Our  youth  have 
been  so  brought  up  to  hear  political  talk  from  their  very  cra- 
dles; they  have  learned  to  be  so  on  the  defensive  in  regard  to 
the  peculiar  institution ;  they  have  been  more  or  less  in  the 
exercise  of  a  certain  power,  arising  from  the  presence  of  a  ser- 
vile race;  tlie  temptation  to  live  in  the  midst  of  and  help  to 
control  affairs  has  been  so  present  to  them,— that  this  vivid  life 
has  had  charms  not  found  in  any  scholarly  seclusion.  Southern 
literature  has  run  in  the  line  of  state  papers  and  national 
speeches  and  senatorial  debates  and  patriotic  orations.  In  this 
channel  the  South  is  not  content  to  yield  superiority  to  the  North. 
It  has  indeed  become  a  taunt  that  the  South  aims  to  raise  only 
statesmen  and  public  characters.  This,  without  doubt,  has  been 
one  of  the  rocks  on  which  our  literary  force  has  too  much  spent 
and  broken  itself.  And  here  again  obtains  too  largely  the  Eng- 
lish idea  that  the  great  proprietors  and  landholders  have  every- 
thing to  do  with  the  government  of  the  country.  The  English 
country  gentleman  has  his  eye  on  the  House  of  Commons ;  the 
career  of  legislator  has  had  overweening  attractions  for  the 
Southern  educated  mind.  The  withdrawn  life  of  letters  has 
seemed  slow;  its  results  were  not  immediate,  nor  were  they 
assured.  Even  those  who  might  have  distinguished  themselves 
with  their  pens  have  been  turned  aside.  Jefferson  would  rather 
have  been  the  author  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  than 


70  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

,  have  written  all  Addison's  essays.  Marshall,  though  he  pro- 
duced the  accepted  biography  of  the  first  President,  did  it  as  a 
labor  of  love,  not  a  work  of  ambition — not  as  Motley  wrote  the 
history  of  WilHim  the  Silent.  But  whatever  literary  power  he 
was  possessed  of  was  soon  diverted  to  the  far  more  important 
work  of  giving  shape  to  the  jurisprudence  of  the  United  States — 
a  work  equaling,  perhaps,  what  has  been  done  by  Kent  or 
Story. 

Madison  and  Monroe  chose  to  spend  their  strength  upon  state 
papers  rather  than  upon  the  elegance  of  letters.  Wirt,  with  his 
charm  of  style,  might  have  been  almost  a  Geoffrey  Crayon,  but 
politics  overruled  him.  Kennedy  could  easily  have  disputed 
laurels  with  Cooper  had  his  native  Maryland  not  found  more 
important  work  for  him  to  do.  Legare  might  have  written 
works  on  international  law  equal  to  others  had  not  South  Caro- 
lina needed  him  for  something  else.  There  have  been  multi- 
tudes of  strangled  poets  who  had  the  spirit  of  song  choked  out 
by  surrounding  circumstances.  Public  Southern  opinion  de- 
cided that  there  was  something  more  virile  to  do  than  spend 
one's  days  in  polishing  tropes.  At  all  events,  such  a  choice,  if 
there  were  nothing  else  to  look  to,  was  sure  to  condemn  the 
chooser  to  that  res  angusta  domi  which  the  comfort-loving, 
physical  nature  of  the  Simon-pure  Southerner  does  not  find 
agreeable.  Mingling  with  affairs,  or  looking  after  his  own  cot- 
ton, rice,  or  tobacco  fields,  would  leave  him  far  wider  margins 
for  the  cultivation  of  his  strong  social  instincts,  and  add  infi- 
nitely more  to  his  pecuniary  importance.  And,  then,  was  it  not, 
in  the  eye  of  all  around  him,  voted  more  manly?  (Perhaps  the 
erratic  and  brief  career  of  our  Virginia  poet,  Edgar  Poe,  had  a 
damaging  irtfluence  on  the  literary  life  as  viewed  from  the 
standpoint  of  success.)  We  have  no  sympathy,  not  even  the 
remotest,  with  any  such  feeling  as  this  to  which  we  have 
alluded,  and  only  call  attention  to  it  as  one  of  the  singular 
anomalies  of  opinion  that  may  have  had  something  to  do  in 
deterring  the  youth  of  our  Southern  land  from  throwing  them- 


Ja 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN   THE   SOUTH,       7 1 

selves  into  the  profession  of  literature.  "  Measure  goods  behind 
a  counter,"'the  parents  of  some  of  them  would  certainly  have 
said,  "  if  you  must,  but  leave  the  spinning  of  verses  to  girls,  and 
the  painting  of  pictures  and  carrying  of  marbles  to  those  effemi- 
nate people'who  have  not  thew  and  sinew  for  man  s  work." 

It  has  been  undeniable  that  to  be  a  poet  only,  to  be  an  artist 
and  no  more,  to  be  a  sculptor,  a  novelist,  an  essayist,  a  mere 
producer  of  pleasure  for  other  people,  as  a  trade,  has  not  seemed 
the  highest  aim  of  manhood  to  the  contracted  vision  of  the 
Southerner.  When  the  Shah  of  Persia,  on  his  visit,  a  few  years 
ago,  to  England,  saw  the  duchesses  and  noble  ladies  dancing  till 
they  wearied  themselves,  he  innocently  asked ,  '*  Why  do  these 
lovely  ladies  tire  themselves  so  ?  In  my  country  we  have  people 
to  do  this  for  us !" 

We  are  not  yet  sufficiently  freed  from  the  traditions  and  preju- 
dices of  by-gone  generations  to  feel  that  there  is  true  nobility 
in  every  kind  of  labor— to  realize  that 

No  earnest  work 
Of  any  honest  creature,  howbeit  weak, 
Imperfect,  ill-adapted,  fails  so  much 
That  ^tis  not  gathered  as  a  grain  of  sand 
Xo  swell  the  sum  of  human  action,  used 
For  carrying  out  God's  end. 

Yet  mixed  up  with  our  Saxon  blood  we  have  no  little  of  the 
nerve  and  activity  of  the  old  Norman  elements  of  chivalry  and 
strength  and  manliness — elements  which  have  saved  the  higher 
classes  of  the  South  from  the  undue  domination  of  soft  climate, 
easy  living,  and  the  too  general  exemption  from  the  goads  of 
labor.  For  when  the  stress  has  come,  the  educated  mind  among 
us  has  always  roused  itself  to  meet  the  emergency.  When  the 
occasion  demanded,  Patrick  Henry  could  flash  his  burning 
words  of  patriotism  like  a  Chatham.  The  wars  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, of  1812,  of,  Mexico,  could  summon  forth  as  leaders  Wash- 
ington, Jackson,  and  Scott.  The  late  unhappy  war  furnisheci 
as  many  heroes  to  the  world's  eye  from  *he  South  as  the  North. 


72  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

The  comrnon  soldier  from  the  forests  of  ^aine  could  not  out- 
suffer  the  common  soldier  from  the  swiamps  of  Georgia.* 

The  slender  finger  of  Randolph  of  Roanoke  was  able  to  make 
senates  stir  at  times.  Calhoun  could  show  himself  a  stern 
Cato.  Hayne  was  not  afraid  to  cross  swords  with  Webster." 
Clay  could  prove  himself  a  parliamentary  leader  like  Fox.  Pres- 
ton of  South  Carolina  could  charm  like  Everett.  But,  then,  the 
underlying  motive  that  goaded  the  performance  was  something 
stronger  than  any  thought  of  literature,  or  art,  or  perfection  for 
perfection's  sake  could  ever  have  furnished.  It  was  the  sort  of 
stimulus  that  now  and  then  made  Napoleon  in  presence  of  his 
armies  an  orator. 

Another  reason  of  the  hitherto  low  condition  of  literary  exe- 
cution among  us  has  been  the  fact  that  we  have  been  tpo  con- 
tent with  ourselves  just  as  we  are ;  and  the  dead  level  of  such 
stagnant  content  has  barred  progress  in  the  direction  of  letters, 
as  it  has  our  material  prosperity.  Our  critics  and  judges  give  a 
harsher  name  to  the  characteristic,  and  call  it  superciliousness ; 
and  perhaps  they  have  some  reason  for  doing  so.  Just  as  we 
have  scorned  to  substitute  for  our  old  plantation  homes,  with 
their  broad  spaces,  their  cosy  ways  of  living,  their  old-fashioned 
ease  and  refinement,  the  modern  spruce  villa,  with  its  varied 
appliances  for  comfort  and  its  labor-saving  mechanisms,  so  have 
we  clung  to  the  wonted  system  of  things.  It  was  very  well 
under  that  system  to  insist  upon  the  pitcher  of  water  being 
brought  fresh  from  the  gushing  spring  an  eighth  of  a  mile  off 
when  anyone  was  athirst,  since  a  bevy  of  little  black  runners 
were  glad  to  have  something  to  do  for  a  change ;  but,  now  that 
these  same  runners  are  studying  Latin  and  calculus,  it  becomes 
us  to  alter  our  base,  and  lay  down  the  more  convenient  water- 
pipes. 

No  doubt,  too,  our  conservative  South  has  been  intensely  pro- 
vincial in  many  ways.  Our  people  have  lived  to  themselves, 
and  so  have  missed  the  mental  attrition  which  mingling  with  the 
world  at  large  furnishes.    They  have  not  gone  dbout  as  travel- 


THE  LITERARY  PROFESSION  IN  THE   SOUTH.       71 

^rs  to  the  extent  that  Northern  people  have.  They  have  not 
been  familiarized  with  literary  circles ;  they  have  not  in  large 
enough  degree  seen  works  of  art  or  architecture ;  they  have  not 
sufficiently  walked  foreign  galleries  and  studied  the* master- 
pieces of  antiquity,  and  wandered  over  museums  and  stood  in 
the  quadrangles  of  hoary  universities,  and  grown  enthusiastic 
over  the  glorious  achievements  of  the  old  world.  They  ^ave 
not  realized  how  all  lands  crown  with  their  highest  honore  their 
literary  and  artistic  workers. 

For  the  last  fifteen  years  the  South  has  been  endeavoring  to 
right  herself.  Like  a  great  vessel  that  has  weathered  the  storm 
with  the  loss  of  all  her  sails  and  masts,  she  is  trimming  herself 
as  bravely  as  she  can  to  meet  the  emergencies  before  her.  She 
sees  plainly  enough  now  that 

The  old  order  changeth,  giving  place  to  new. 
And  God  fulfills  himself  in  many  ways ! 

and  there  grows  gradually  over  the  Southern  mind  a  spirit  of 
acquiescence  -and  acceptance. 

Those  who  are  observant  of  the  signs  of'  the  time  see  tokens 
everywhere  that  pM-edict  the  passing  away  of  the  hindering  tra- 
ditions and  prejudices  that,  sacred  as  they  may  have  seemed  to 
the  old  generations,  will  now  only  prove  trammels  to  the  new. 
On  all  hands  the  South  is  beginning  to  encourage  the -upbuild- 
ing of  its  towns  and  cities :  the  old  plantation  life  has  lost  its 
prestige,  and  never  can  be  again  what  it  was  in  the  past.  Neigh- 
borhoods are  trying  to  crowd  more  together.  The  impulse  of 
vicinage  is  being  felt.  Our  schools  and  colleges  are  everywhere 
coming  into  healthy  operation.  The  weak  idea  of  the  servility 
of  labor  is  fast  losing  ground.  Fresh  life  has  been  infused  into 
our  daiJy  and  weekly  press.  Notwithstanding  their  greater  pov- 
erty, the  Southern  people  go  abroad  far  more  than  they  did  in 
ante-bellum  days,  and  thereby  get  the  cobwebs  of  prejudice 
swept  from  their  brains.  We  have  text-books  now  issuing  from 
our  universities ;  we  have  volumes  of  poems  published  of  which 


74  -  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

even  The  Saturday  Review  and  The  Academy  of  London  con- 
descend to  take  note ;  we  have  begun  to  send  forth  essays  and 
travels  and  books  of  science  that  meet  the  commendation  of  the 
best  critics  of  the  land.  We  might  add  instances  and  references 
to  verify  what  we  have  said,  but  it  is  outside  of  our  purpose  to 
go  into  any  individual  detail. 

A  bright  and  attractive  future,  then,  we  believe  is  about  to 
open  before  those  among  us  who  may  hereafter  give  themselves 
to  letters.  With  the  possession  of  genius,  which  nature  has  not 
made  a  matter  of  geography;  with  the  full  equipment  which  a 
thorough  culture  demands;  with  the  priceless  inheritance  of 
the  richest  historic  associations ;  with  a  marvelously  picturesque 
past,  whose  local  coloring  is  the  fairest  which  this  transatlan- 
tic land  affords ;  with  the  material  prosperity  which  in  time 
must  come;  with  our  noble  rivers,  our  unopened  mines,  our 
varied  and  delicious  climates,  our  great  world-staples — cotton, 
tobacco,  rice,  and  sugar ;  with  the  influx  of  new  populations ; 
with  the  stir  and  march  and  thunder  of  the  times  filling  our 
ears ;  with  the  wealth  and  prosperity  that  must  give  our  South- 
ern land  its  proper  place  among  the  great  brotherhood  of  states, 
— what  is  there  to  hinder  this  wide,  vast  South  from  taking  its 
position  as  a  leader  in  the  world  of  letters,  as  the  equal  and 
peer  of  the  North  ?  That  in  the  nature  of  things  this  time  will 
speedily  come,  we  surely  do  believe. 

Margaret  J.  Preston. 
Lexington,  Va. 


JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN. 

My  dear :  My  present  letter  will  be  given  to  a  single  fig- 
ure. When  I  entered  at  Oxford  John  Henry  Newman  was  be.^in- 
ning  to  be  famous.  The  responsible  authorities  were  watching 
him  with  anxiety ;  clever  men  were  looking  with  interest  and  curi- 
osity on  the  apparition  among  them  of  one  of  those  persons  of 


JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN.  7S 

indisputable  genius  who  was  likely  to  make  a  mark  upon  his 
time.  His  appearance  was  striking.  He  was  above  the  middle 
height,  slight  and  spare.  His  head  was  large,  his  face  remarka- 
bly like  that  of  Julius  Caesar.  The  forehead,  the  shape  of  the 
ears  and  nose,  were  almost  the  same.  The  lines  of  the  mouth 
were  very  peculiar,  and  I  should  say  exactly  the  same.  I  have 
often  thought  of  the  resemblance,  and  believed  that  it  extended 
to  the  temperament.  In  both  there  was  an  original  force  of 
character  which  refused  to  be  molded  by  circumstances,  which 
was  to  make  its  own  way,  and  become  a  power  in  the  world ;  a 
clearness  of  intellectual  perception,  a  disdain  for  conventionali- 
ties, a  temper  imperious  ana  willful,  but  along  with  it  a  most 
attaching  gentleness,  sweetness,  singleness  of  heart  and  purpose. 
Both  were  formed  by  nature  to  command  others,  both  had  the 
faculty  of  attracting  to  themselves  the  passionate  devotion  of 
their  friends  and  followers;  and  in  both  cases,  too,  perhaps  the 
devotion  was  rather  due  to  the  personal  ascendency  of  the  leader 
than  to  the  cause  which  he  represented.  It  was  Caesar,  not  the 
principle  of  the  empire,  which  overthrew  Pompey  and  the  consti- 
tution. Credo  in  Newmannum  was  a  common  phrase  at  Oxford, 
and  is  still  unconsciously  the  faith  of  nine-tenths  of  the  English 
converts  to  Rome. 

When  I  first  saw  him  he  had  written  his  book  upon  the  Arians. 
An  accidental  application  had  set  him  upon  it,  at  a  time,  I 
believe,  when  he  had  half  resolved  to  give  himself  to  science  and 
mathematics,  and  had  so  determined  him  into  a  theological 
career.  He  had  published  a  volume  or  two  of  parochial  ser- 
mons. A  few  short  poems  of  his  had  also  appeared  in  the  British 
Magazine  under  the  signature  of  •*  Delta,"  which  were  reprinted 
in  the  "Lyra  Apostolica."  They  were  unlike  any  other  relig- 
ious poetry  which  was  then  extant.  It  was  hard  to  say  why 
they  were  so  fascinating.  They  had  none  of  the  musical  grace 
of  the  "  Christian  Year."  They  were  not  harmonious ;  the  meter 
halted,  the  rhymes  were  irregular,  yet  there  was  something  in 
them  which  seized  the    attention,  and  would   not  let  it  g- 


76  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Keble's  verses  flowed  in  soft  cadence  over  the  mind,  delightful, 
as  sweet  sounds  are  delightful,  but  are  forgotten  as  the  vibrations 
die  away.  Newman's  had  pierced  into  the  heart  and  mind,  and 
there  remained.  The  literary  critics  of  the  day  were  puzzled. 
They  saw  that  he  was  not  an  ordinary  man ;  what  sort  of  an 
extraordinary  man  he  was  they  could  not  tell.  "The  eye  of 
Melpomene  had  been  cast  upon  him,"  said  the  omniscient  (I 
think)  Athenaeum  ;*  "  but  the  glance  was  not  fixed  or  steady." 
The  eye  of  Melpomene  had  extremely  little  to  do  in  the  matter. 
Here  were  thoughts  like  no  other  man's  thoughts,  and  emotions 
like  no  other  man's  emotions.  Here  was  a  man  who  really 
believed  his  creed,  and  let  it  follow  him  into  all  his  observations 
upon  outward  things.  He  had  been  traveling  in  Greece;  he 
had  carried  with  him  his  recollections  of  Thucydides,  and,  while 
his  companions  were  sketching  olive  gardens  and  old  castles 
and  picturesque  harbors  at  Corfu,  Newman  was  recalling  the 
scenes  which  those  harbors  had  witnessed  thousands  of  years 
ago  in  the  civil  wars  which  the  Greek  historian  has  made  immor- 
tal. There  was  nothing  in  this  that  was  unusual.  Any  one  with 
a  well-stored  memory  is  affected  by  historical  scenery.  But 
Newman  was  oppressed  with  the  sense  that  the  men  who  had 
fallen  in  that  desperate  strife  were  still  alive,  as  much  as  he  and 
his  friends  were  alive. 

Their  spirits  live  in  awful  singleness, 

he  says, 

Each  in  its  self-formed  sphere  of  light  or  gloom. 

We  should  all,  perhaps,  have  acknowledged  this  in  words.  It  is 
happy  for  us  that  we  do  not  all  realize  what  the  words  mean. 
The  minds  of  most  of  us  would  break  down  under  the  strain. 

Othe'r  conventional  beliefs,  too,  were  quickened  into  startling 
realities.     We  had  been  hearing  much  in  those  days  about  the 

*  Perhaps  it  was  not  the  Athenseum.  I  quote  from  memory.  I  remember  the 
passage  from  the  amusement  which  it  gave  me  ;  but  it  was  between  forty  and  fifty 
years  ago,  and  I  have  never  seen  it  since. 


John  henry  newman  77 

benevolence  of  the  Supreme  Being,  and  our  corresponding  obli- 
gation to  charity  and  philanthropy.  If  the  received  creed  was 
true,  benevolence  was  by  no  means  the  only  characteristic  of 
that  Being.  What  God  loved  we  might  love;  but  there  were 
things  which  God  did  not  love;  accordingly  we  found  Newman 
saying  to  us — 

Christian,  would*st  thou  learn  to  love  ? 

First  learn  thee  how  to  hate. 
*  *  *  * 

Hatred  of  sin  and  zeal  and  fear 

Lead  up  the  Holy  Hill ; 
Track  them,  till  charity  appear 

A  self-denial  still. 

It  was  not  austerity  that  made  him  speak  so.  No  one  was  more 
essentially  tender-hearted ;  but  he  took  the  usually  accepted 
Christian  account  of  man  and  his  destiny  to  be  literally  true,  and 
the  terrible  character  of  it  weighed  upon  him. 

Sunt  lacrym^e  rerum  et  mentem  mortalia  tangunt. 

He  could  be  gentle  enough  in  other  moods.  "  Lead,  kindly 
Light,"  is  the  most  popular  hymn  in  the  language.  All  of  us. 
Catholic,  Protestant,  or  such  as  can  see  their  way  to  no  positive 
creed  at  all,  can  here  meet  on  common  ground  and  join  in  a 
common  prayer.  Familiar  as  the  lines  are  they  may  here  be 
written  down  once  more : 

Lead,  kindly  Light,  amid  the  encircling  gloom 

Lead  Thou  me  on. 
The  night  is  dark,  and  I  am  far  from  home, 

Lead  Thou  me  on. 
Keep  Thou  my  feet ;  I  do  not  ask  to  see 
Far  distant  scenes— one  step  enough  for  me. 

I  was  not  ever  thus,  nor  prayed  that  Thou 

Should  *st  lead  me  on. 
I  loved  to  choose  and  see  my  path  ;  but  now 

Lead  Thou  me  on.  , 

I  loved  the  garish  day,  and,  spite  of  fears, 
Pride  ruled  my  will.    Remember  not  past  years. 


78  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

So  longr  Thy  power  has  blest  us,  sure  it  will 

Still  lead  us  on,  .  - 

0*er  moor  and  fen,  o*er  crag  and  torrent,  till 

•The  night  is  gone. 
And  with  the  mom  those  angel  faces  smile 
Which  I  have  loved  long  since,  and  lost  awhile. 

It  has  been  said  that  men  of  letters  are  either  much  less  or 
much  grater  than  their  writings.  Cleverness  and  the  skillful 
use  of  other  people's  thoughts  produce  works  which  take  us  in 
till  we  see  the  authors,  and  then  we  are  disenchanted.  A  man 
of  genius,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  spring  in  which  there  is  always 
more  behind  than  flows  from  it.  The  painting  or  the  poem  is 
but  a  part  of  him  inadequately  realized,  and  his  nature  expresses 
itself,  with  equal  or  fuller  completeness,  in  his  life,  his  conver- 
sation, and  personal  presence.  This  was  eminently  true  of  New- 
man. Greatly  as  his  poetry  had  struck  me,  he  was  himself  all 
that  the  poetry  was,  and  something  far  beyond.  I  had  then 
never  seen  so  impressive  a  person.  I  met  him  now  and  then  in 
private;  I  attended  his  church  and  heard  him  preach  Sunday 
after  Sunday ;  he  is  supposed  to  have  been  insidious,  to  have 
led  his  disciples  on  to  conclusions  to  which  he  designed  to  bring 
them,  while  his  purpose  was  carefully  veiled.  He  was,  on  the 
contrary,  the  most  transparent  of  men.  He  told  us  what  he 
believed  to  be  true.  He  did  not  know  where  it  would  carry  him. 
No  one  who  has  ever  risen  to  any  great  height  in  this  world 
refuses  to  move  till  he  knows  where  he  is  going.  He  is  impelled 
in  each  step  which  he  takes  by  a  force  within  himself.  He  sat- 
isfies himself  only  that  the  step  is  a  right  one,  and  he  leaves  the 
rest  to  Providence.  Newman's  mind  was  world-wide.  He  was 
interested  in  ever3rthing  which  was  going  on  in  science,  in  poli- 
tics, in  literature.  Nothing  was  too  large  for  him,  nothing  too 
trivial,  if  it  threw  light  upon  the  central  question,  what  man 
really  was,  and  what  was  his  destiny.  He  was  careless  about 
his  personal  prospects.  He  had  no  ambition  to  make  a  career, 
or  to  rise  to  rank  and  power.  Still  less  had  pleasure  any  seduc- 
tions for  him.    His  natural  temperament  was  bright  and  light; 


JOHN  HENHY  NEWMAN  79 

his  senses,  even  the  commonest,  were  exceptionally  delicate.  I 
was  told  that,  though  he  rarely  drank  wine,  he  was  trusted  to 
choose  the  vintages  for  the  college  cellar.  He  could  admire 
enthusiastically  any  greatness  of  action  and  character,  however 
remote  the  sphere  of  it  from  his  own.  Gurwood's  "  Dispatches 
of  the  Duke  of  Wellington"  cime  out  just  then.'  Newman  had 
been  reading  the  book,  and  a  friend  asked  him  what  he  thought 
of  it.  *•  Think  ?"  he  said,  **  it  makes  one  burn  to  have  been  a 
soldier."  But  his  own  subject  was  the  absorbing  interest  with 
him.  Where  Christianity  is  a  real  belief,  where  there  are  dis- 
tinct convictions  that  a  man's  own  self  and  the  millions  of 
human  beings  who  are  playing  on  the  earth's  surface  are  the 
objects  of  a  supernatural  disjDensation,  and  are  on  the  road  to 
heaven  or  hell,  the  most  powerful  mind  may  well  be  startled  at 
the  aspect  of  things.  If  Christianity  was  true,  since  Christianity 
was  true  (for  Newman  at  no  time  doubted  the  reality  of  the 
revelation),  then  modem  England,  modern  Europe,  with  its 
march  of  intellect  and  its  useful  knowledge  and  its  material  prog- 
ress, was  advancing  with  a  light  heart  into  ominous  conditions. 
Keble  had  looked  into  no  lines  of  thought  but  his  own.  New- 
man had  read  omnivorously;  he  had  studied  modern  thought 
and  modern  life  in  all  its  forms,  and  with  all  its  many-colored 
passions.  ^He  knew,  of  course,  that  many  men  of  learning  and 
ability  believed  that  Christianity  was  not  a  revelation  at  all,  but 
had  been  thrown  out,  like  other  creeds,  in  the  growth  of  the 
human  mind.  He  knew  that  doubts  of  this  kind  were  the  inevi- 
table results  of  free  discussion  and  free  toleration  of  differences 
of  opinion;  and  he  was  too  candid  to  attribute  such  doubts,  as 
others  did,  to  wickedness  of  heart.  He  could  not,  being  what 
he  was,  acquiesce  in  the  established  religion  as  he  would  acqui- 
esce in  the  law  of  the  land,  because  it  was  there,  and  because  the 
country  had  accepted  it,  and  because  good  general  reasons  could 
be  given  for  assuming  it  to  be  right.  The  soundest  arguments, 
even  the  arguments  of  Bishop  Butler  himself,  went  ho  further 
than  to  establish  a  probability.     But  religion  with  Newman  wa? 


8o  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

a  personal  thing  between  himself  and  his  Maker,  and  it  was  not 
possible  to  feel  love  and  devotion  to  a  Being  whose  existence 
was  merely  probable ;  as  Carlyle,  says  of  himself  when  in  a  simi- 
lar condition,  a  religion  which  was  not  a  certainty  was  a  mock- 
ery and  a  horror ;  and,  unshaken  and  unshakable  as  his  own  con- 
victions were,  Newman  evidently  was  early  at  a  loss  for  the  intel- 
lectual grounds  on  which  the  claims  of  Christianity  to  abstract 
belief  could  be  based.  The  Protestant  was  satisfied  with  the 
Bible,  the  original  text  of  which,  and  perhaps  the  English  trans- 
lation, he  regarded  as  inspired.  But  the  inspiration  itself  was 
an  assumption,  and  had  to  be  proved ;  and  Newman,  though  he 
believed  the  inspiration,  seems  to  have  recognized  earlier  than 
most  of  his  contemporaries  that  the  Bible  was  not  a  single  book, 
but  a  national  literature,  produced  at  intervals,  during  many 
hundred  years,  and  under  endless  varieties  of  circumstances. 
Protestant  and  Catholic  alike  appealed  to  it;  and  they  could 
not  both  be  right.  Yet  if  the  differences  between  them  were 
essential,  there  must  be  some  authority  capable  of  deciding 
between  them.  The  Anglican  church  had  a  special  theology  of  its 
own,  professing  to  be  based  on  the  Bible.  Yet  to  suppose  that 
each  individual  left  to  himself  would  gather  out  of  the  Bible,  if 
able  and  conscientious,  exactly  these  opinions,  and  no  others, 
was  absurd  and  contrary  to  experience.  There  were  the  creeds ; 
but  on  what  authority  did  the  creeds  rest  ?  On  the  "four  coun- 
cils ?  or  on  other  councils,  and  if  other,  on  which  ?  Was  it  on 
the  Church,  and  if  so,  on  what  church  ?  The  Church  of  the 
Fathers?  or  the  Church  still  present  and  alive  and  speaking? 
If  for  living  men,  among  whom  new  questions  were  perpetually 
rising,  a  Clnirch  which  was  also  Jiving  could  not  be  dispensed 
with ;  then  what  was  that  Church,  and  to  what  conclusions  would 
such  an  admission  lead  us? 

With  us  undergraduates,  Newman,  of  course,  did  not  enter  on 
such  important  questions,  although  they  were  in  the  air,  and  we 
talked  about  them  among  ourselves.  He.  when  we  met  him, 
spoke  to  us  about  subjects  of  the  day,  of  literature,  of  public  per- 


JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN  8l 

sons,  and  incidents,  of  everything  which  was  generally  interest- 
ing. He  seemed  always  to  be  better  informed  on  common  topics 
of  conversation  than  any  one  else  who  was  present.  He  was 
never  condescending  with  us,  never  didactic  or  authoritative ;  but 
what  he  said  carried  conviction  along  with  it.  When  we  were 
wrong  he  knew  why  we  were  wrong,  and  excused  our  mistakes 
to  ourselves  while  he  set  us  right.  Perhaps  his  supreme  merit 
as  a  talker  was  that  he  never  tried  to  be  witty  or  to  say  striking 
things.  Ironical  he  could  b^,  but  not  ill-natured.  Not  a  mali- 
cious anecdote  was  ever  heard  from  him.  Prosy  he  could  not 
be.  He  was  lightness  itself — the  lightness  of  elastic  strength — 
and  he  was  interesting  because  he  never  talked  for  talking  s  sake, 
but  because  he  had  something  real  to  say. 

Thus  it  was  that  we,  who  had  never  seen  such  another  man, 
and-to  whom  he  appeared,  perhaps,  at  special  advantage  in  con- 
trast with  the  normal  college  don,  came  to  regard  Newman  with 
the  affection  of  pupils  (though  pupils,  strictly  speaking,  he  had 
none)  for  an  idolized  master.  The  simplest  word  which  dropped 
from  him  was  treasured  as  if  it  had  been  an  intellectual  diamond. 
For  hundreds  of  young  men  Credo  in  Newmannum  was  the  genu- 
ine symbol  of  faith. 

Personal  admiration,  of  course,  inclined  us  to  look  to  him  as 
a  guide  in  matters  of  religion.  No  one  who  heard  his  sermons 
in  those  days  can  ever  forget  them.  They  were  seldom  directly 
theological.  We  had  theology  enough  and  to  spare  from  the 
select  preachers  before  the  university.  Newman,  taking  some 
Scripture  character  for  a  text,  spoke  to  us  about  ourselves,  our 
temptations,  our  experiences.  His  illustrations  were  inexhausti- 
ble. He  seemed  to  be  addressing  the  most  secret  consciousness 
of  each  of  us — as  the  eyes  of  a  portrait  appear  to  look  at  every 
person  in  a  room.  He  never  exaggerated ;  he  was  never  unreal. 
A  sermon  from  him  was  a  poem,  formed  on  a  distinct  idea,  fas- 
cinating by  its  subtlety,  welcome — how  welcome! — from  its  sin- 
cerity, interesting  from  its  originality,  even  to  those  who  were 
careless  of  religion ;  and  to  others  who  wished  to  be  religious 


82  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

but  had  found  religion  dry  and  wearisome,  it  was  like  the  spring- 
ing of  a  fountain  out  of  the  rock. 

The  hearts  of  men  vibrate  in  answer  to  one  another  like  the 
strings  of  musical  instruments.  These  sermons  were,  I  suppose, 
the  records  of  Newman's  own  mental  experience.  They  appear 
to  me  to  be  the  outcome  of  continued  meditation  upon  his  fel- 
low-creature^ and  their  position  in  this  world  ;  their  awful  re- 
sponsibilities;  the  mystefy  of  their  nature,  strangely  mixed  of 
good  and  evil,  of  strength  and  weakness.  A  tone,  not  of  fear, 
but  of  infinite  pity,  runs  through  them  all,  and  along  with  it  a 
resolution  to  look  facts  in  the  face;  not  to  fly  to  evasive  generali- 
ties about  infinice  mercy  and  benevolence,  but  to  examine  what 
revelation  really  has  added  to  our  knowledge,  either  of  what  we 
are  or  of  what  lies  before  us.  We  were  met  on  all  sides  with  dif- 
ficulties; for  experience  did  not  confirm,  it  rather  contradicted, 
what  revelation  appeared  distinctly  to  assert.  I  recollect  a  ser- 
mon from  him — I  think  in  the  year  1839;  I  have  never  read 
it  since ;  I  may  not  now  remember  the  exact  words,  but  the 
impression  left  is  ineffaceable.  It  was  on  the  trials  of  faith,  of 
which  he  gave  different  illustrations.  He  supposed,  first,  two 
children  to  be  educated  together,  of  similar  temperament  and 
under  similar  conditions,  one  of  whom  was  baptized  and  the 
other  unbaptized.  He  represented  them  as  growing  up  equally 
amiable,  equally  upright,  equally  reverent  and  God-fearing,  with 
no  outward  evidence  that  one  was  in  a  different  spiritual  con dir 
tion  from  the  other;  yet  we  were  required  to  believe  riot  only 
that  their  condition  was  totally  different,  but  that  one  was  a 
child  of  God,  and  his  companion  was  not. 

Again,  he  drew  a  sketch  of  the  average  men  and  women  who 
made  up  society,  whom  we  ourselves  encountered  in  daily  life, 
or  were  connected  with,  or  read  about  in  newspapers.  They 
were  neither  special  saints  nor  special  sinners.  Religious  men 
had  faults,  and  often  serious  ones.  Men  careless  of  religion 
were  often  amiable  in  private  life,  good  husbands,  good  fathers, 
ady  friends ;  in  public  honorable,  brave,  and  patriotic.    Even 


JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN,  83 

in  the  worst  and  wickedest,  in  a  witch  of  Endor,  there  was  a 
human  heart  and  human  tenderness.  None  seemed  good  enough 
for  heaven,  none  so  bad  as  to  deserve  to  be  consigned  to  the 
company  of  evil  spirits,  and  to  remain  in  pain  and  misery  for- 
ever. Yet  all  these  people  were,  in  fact,  divided  one  from  the 
other  by  an  invisible  line  of  separation.  If  they  were  to  die  on 
the  spot  as  they-  actually  were,  some  would  be  saved,  the  rest 
would  be  lost — the  saved  to  have  eternity  of  happiness,  the  lost 
to  be  with  the  devils  in  hell. 

Again,  I  am  not  sure  whether  it  was  on  the  same  occasion, 
but  it  was  in  following  the  same  line  of  thought,  Newman  de- 
scribed closely  some  of  the  incidents  of  our  Lord's  passion  ;  he 
then  paused.  For  a  few  moments  there  was  a  breathless  silence. 
Then,  in  a  low.  clear  voice,  of  which  the  faintest  vibration  was 
audible  in  the  farthest  corner  of  St.  Mary's,  he  said,  '*  Now,  I  bid 
you  recollect  that  He  to  whom  these  things  were  done  was 
Almighty  God."  It  was  as  if  an  electric  stroke  had  gone  through 
the  church,  as  if  every  person  present  understood  for  the  first 
time  the  meaning  of  what  he  had. all  his  life  been  saying.  I  sup- 
pose it  was  an  epoch  in  the  mental  history  of  more  than  one  of 
my  Oxford  contemporaries. 

Another  sermon  left  its  mark  upon  me.  It  was  upon  evi- 
dence. I  had  supposed  up  to  that  time  that  the  chief  events 
related  in  the  Gospels  were  as  well  authenticated  as  any  other 
facts  of  history.  I  had  read  Paley  and  Grotius  at  school,  and 
their  arguments  had  been  completely  satisfactory  to  me.  The 
Gospels  had  been  written  by  apostles  or  companions  of  apostles. 
There  was  sufficient  evidence,  in  Paley 's  words,  "that  many  pro- 
fessing to  be  original  witnesses  of  the  Christian  miracles  had 
passed  their  lives  in  labors,  dangers,  and  sufferings  in  attesta- 
tion of  the  accounts  which  they  delivered."  St.  Paul  was  a 
further  and  independent  authority.  It  was  not  conceivable  that 
such  men  as  St.  Paul  and  the  other  apostles  evidently  were 
should  have  conspired  to  impose  a  falsehood  upon  the  world, 
and  should  have  succeeded  in  doing  it  undetected  in  an  age 


84  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

exceptionally  cultivated  and  skeptical.  Gibbon  I  had  studied 
also,  and  had  thought  about  the  five  causes  by  which  he  ex- 
plained how  Christianity  came  to  be  believed;  but  they  had 
seemed  to  me  totally  inadequate.  I  was  somethfng  more 
than  surprised,  therefore,  when  I  heard  Newman  say  that 
Hume's  argument  against  the  credibility  of  miracles  was  logi- 
cally sound.  The  laws  of-  nature,  so  i^t  as  could  be  observed, 
were  uniform  ;  and  in  any  given  instance  it  was  more  likely  as  a 
mere  matter  of  evidence  that  men  should  tieceive  or  be  deceived, 
than  that  those  laws  should  have  been  deviated  trom.  Of  course 
he  did  not  leave  the  matter  in  this  position.  Hume  goes  on  to 
say  that  he  is  speaking  of  evidence  as  addressed  to  the  reason ; 
the  Christian  religion  addresses  itself  to  faith,  and  the  credibil- 
ity of  it  is  therefore  unaffected  by  his  objection.  What  Hume 
said  in  irony.  Newman  accepted  in  earnest.  Historically  the 
proofs  were  insufficient,  or  sufficient  only  to  create  a  sense  of 
probability.  Christianity  was  apprehended  by  a  faculty  essen- 
tially different.  It  was  called  faith.  But  what  was  faith,  and 
on  what  did  it  rest?  Was  it  as  if  mankind  had  been  born  with 
but  four  senses,  by  which  to  form  their  notions  of  things  exter- 
nal to  them,  and  that  a  fifth  sense  of  sight  was  suddenly  con- 
ferred on  favored  individuals,  Which  converted  conjecture  into 
certainty  ?  I  could  not  tell.  For  myself  this  way  of  putting 
the  matter  gave  me  ho  new  sense  at  all,  and  only  taught  me  to 
distrust  my  old  ones. 

I  say  at  once  that  I  think  it  was  injudicious  of  Newman  to 
throw  out  before  us  thus  abruptly  an  opinion  so  extremely  agi- 
tating. I  explain  it  by  supposing  that  here,  as  elsewhere,  his 
sermons  contained  simply  the  workings  of  his  own  mind,  and 
were  a  sort  of  public  confession  which  he  made  as  he  went  along. 
I  suppose  that  something  of  this  kind  had  been  passing  through 
him.  He  was  in  advance  of  his  time.  He  had  studied  the  early 
fathers ;  he  had  studied  Church  history,  and  the  lives  of  the 
saints  and  martyrs.  He  knew  that  the  hard  and  fast  line  which 
Protestants  had  drawn  at  which  miracles  had  ceased  was  one 


.JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN  8$ 

whigh  no  historical  canon  could  reasonably  defend.  Stories  of 
the  exercise  of  supernatural  power  ran  steadily  from  the  begin- 
ning to  the  latest  period  of  the  Church's  existence :  many  of 
them  were  as  well'supported  by  evidence  as  the  miracles  of  the 
New  Testament ;  and  if  reason  was  to  be  the  judge,  no  arbitrary 
separation  of  the  age  of  the  apostles 'from  the  age  of  their  suc- 
cessors was  possible.  Some  of  these  stories  might  be  inven- 
tions, or  had  no  adequate  authority  for  them ;  but  for  others 
there  was  authority  of  eye-witnesses ;  and  if  these  were  to  be  set 
aside  by  a  peremptory  act  of  will  as  unworthy  of  credit,  the  Gos- 
pel miracles  themselves  might  fall  before  the  same  methods. 
The  argument  of  Hume  was  already  silently  applied  to  the  entire 
post-apostolic  period.  It  had  been  checked  by  the  traditionary 
reverence  for  the  Bible.  But  this  was  not  reason  ;  it  was  faith. 
Perhaps,  tok),  he  saw  that  the  alternative  did  not  lie  as  sharply 
as  Paley  supposed,  between  authentic  fact  and  deliberate  fraud. 
Legends  might  grow;  they  grew  every  day,  about  common 
things  and  persons,  without  intention  to  deceive.  Imagination, 
emotion,  affection,  or,  on  the  other  side,  fear  and  animosity,  are 
busy  with  the  histories  of  men  who  have  played  a  remarkable 
part  in  the  world.  Great  historic  figures — a  William  Tell,  for 
instance — have  probably  had  no  historical  existence  at  all.  and 
yet  are  fastened  indelibly  into  national  traditions.  Such  reflec- 
tions as  these  would  make  it  evident  that  if  the  Christian  mira- 
cles were  to  be  believed,  not  as  possibly  or  probably  true,  but  as 
indisputably  true— true  in  such  a  sense  that  a  man's  life  on  earth, 
and  his  hope  for  the  future,  could  be  securely  based  upon  them 
—the  history  must  be  guaranteed  by  authority  different  in  kind 
from  the  mere  testimony  to  be  gathered  out  of  books.  I  sup- 
pose every  thinking  person  would  now  acknowledge  this  to  be 
true.  And  we  see,  in  fact,  that  Christians  of  various  persuasions 
supplement  the  evidence  in  several  ways. .  Some  assume  the 
verbal  inspiration  of  the  Bible ;  others  are  conscious  of  personal 
experiences  which  make  doubt  impossible.  Others,  again,  appeal 
justly  to  the  existence  of  Christianity  as  a  fact,  and  to  the  power 


86  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MAGAZINE. 

which  it  has  exerted  in  elevating  and  humanizing  mankfnd. 
Newman  found  what  he  wanted  in  the  living  authority  of  the 
Church,  in  the  existence  of  an  organized  body  which  had  been 
instituted  by  our  Lord  himself,  and  was  still  actively  present 
amon;^  us  as  a  living  witness  of  the  truth.  Thus  the.  imperfec- 
tion of  the  outward  evidence  was  itself  an  argument  for  the 
CatboHc  iheory.  All  religious  people  were  agneed  that  the  facts  j 
of  the  Gospel  narrative  really  happened  as  they  were  said  to' 
hav«  happened.  Proof  there  must  be  somewhere  to  justify  the 
conviction  ;  and  proof  could  only  be  found  in  the  admission  that 
the  Church,  the  organized  Church  with  its  bishops  and  priests, 
was  not  a  human  institution,  but  was  the  living  body  through 
which  the  Founder  of  Christianity  himsflf  was  speaking  to  us. 
"  Such,  evidently,  was  one  use  to  which  Hume's  objection  could 
be  applied  ;  and  to  those  who,  like  Newman,  were  provided  with 
the  antidote,  there  was  no  danger  in  admitting  the  force  of  it. 
Nor  wouifl  the  risk  have  been  great  with  his  hearers  if  they  had 
been  playing  with  the  question  as  a  dialectical  exercise.  But  he 
had  made  them  feel  and  think  seriously  about  it  by  his  own 
intense  earnestness ;  and,  brought  up  as  most  of  them  had  been 
to  believe  that  Christianity  had  sufficient  historical  evidence  for 
it,  to  be  suddenly  told  that  the  famous  argument  against  mira- 
cles was  logically  valid  after  all,  was  at  least  startling.  The 
Church  theory,  as  making  good  a  testimony  otherwise  defective, 
was  new  to  most  of  us,  and  not  very  readily  taken  in.  To  re- 
move the  foundation  of  a  belief,  and  to  substitute  another,  is 
like  putting  new  foundations  to  a  house.  The  house  itself  may 
easily  be  overthrown  in  the  process.  I  have  said  before  that  in 
a  healthy  state  of  things  religion  is  considered  too  sacred  to  be 
argued  about.  It  is  believed  as  a  matter  of  duty,  and  the  why 
or  the  wherefore  are  not  so  much  as  thought  about.  Revolu- 
tions are  not  far  off  when  men  begin  to  ask  whence  the  sovereign 
derives  his  authority.  Skepticism  is  not  far  off  when  they  ask 
why  ihey  believe  their  creed.  We  had  all  been  satisfied  about 
Se  Gospel  history;  not  a  shadow  of  doubt  had  crossed  the 


THE  JSiSTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT,  8/ 

minds  of  one  of  us ;  and,  though  we  might  not  have  been  able 
to  give  a  logical  reason  for  our  certitude,  the  certitude  was  in 
us,  and  might  well  have  been  let  alone.  I  for  one  began  to  read 
Hume  attentively,  and  though  old  associations  prevented  me 
from  recognizing  the  full  force  of  what  he  had  to  say,  no  doubt 
I  was  unconsciously  affected  by  him.  It  must  have  been  so, 
lor  I  remember  soon  after  insisting  to  a  friend  that  the  essential 
part  of  religion  was  morality.  My  friend  replied  that  morality 
was  only  possible  to  persons  who  received  power  through  faith 
to  keep  the  commandments.  But  this  did  not  satisfy  me,  for 
it  seemed  contrary  to  fact.  There  were  persons  of  great  excel- 
lence whose  spiritual  beliefs  were  utterly  different.  I  could  not 
bring  myself  to  admit  that  the  goodness,  for  instance,  of  a  Uni- 
tarian was  only  apparent.  After  all  is  said,  the  visible  conduct  of 
men  is  the  best  test  that  we  can  have  of  their  inward  condition. 
If  not  the  best,  where  are  we  to  find  a  better  ? 

JAMES  Anthony  Froude,  in  Good  Words. 


THE  ^ESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT. 

It  was  matter  of  no  small  marvel  to  the  world  when  it  became 
known  that  Jack  Harris  and  Theocritus  Marlowe  were  elected 
to  Parliament.  The  many  people  to  whom  the  names  of  the 
two  distinguished  poets  were  familiar  asked  themselves  what 
special  knowledge  of  politics  they  had  ever  evidenced,  that  they 
should  be  sent  to  represent  any  constituency  at  St.  Stephen's. 
Indeed,  in  the  circles  of  higher  culture,  and  in  society  generally, 
the  speculation  was  great  as  to  the  meaning  of  the  mystery,  the 
real  reason  of  which  was  known  only  to  a  very  few. 

The  Duke  of  Magdiel  had  taken  a  fancy  to  the  two  poets.  He 
was  always  in  want  of  new  ideas  to  amuse  himself  with,  and  the 
thoughts  and  theories  of  Jack  and  Theocritus  opened  up  to  him 
a  new  world  of  which  he  had  not  dreamed  before,  and  which 


88  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

promised  to  offer  him,  if  not  endless  amusement — he  had  out- 
grown even  wishing  for  that — at  least  entertainment  for  a  con- 
siderable period.  So  he  asked  them  down  to  Magdiel  Towers, 
and  listened  with  good-humored  cynicism  to  their  views  of  life 
and  their  rhapsodies  on  the  Beautiful,  and  paid  a  kindly  atten- 
tion while  they  read  him  their  poems  and  other  people's  poems,  • 
and  felt  feebly  thrilled  at  passages  which  recalled  to  him  the"" 
wildness  of  his  long-perished  youth.  One  evening,  in  the  smok- 
ing-room, the  talk  fell  upon  politics,  for  a  foreign  ambassador, 
an  ex-colonial  governor,  and  a  bishop  were  among  the  newest 
visitors  to  Magdiel  Towers,  and  the  duke,  who  had  begun  to  be 
a  little  weary  of  the  arts  as  expounded  by  his  two  poets,  had 
turned  the  talk  upon  the  policy  of  the  Government.  Jack  Har- 
ris had  often  expressed  of  late  a  lofty  scorn  of  politics  and  its 
professors.  He  had  been  heard  to  aver  contemptuously  that  he 
would  not  care  if  England  were  joined  to  America  to-morrow, 
so  long  as  he  were  allowed  to  write  his  sonnets  and  read  his 
Baudelaire.  But  he  did  not  remember  this  as  he  listened  with 
reverent  attention  to  the  duke's  utterances  on  foreign  affairs ; 
and  as  he  never  allowed  himself  to  be  long  silent  upon  any  sub- 
ject, he  soon  flung  himself  boldly  into  the  conversation  and 
startled  some  of  his  hearers  by  a  novel  theory  of  politics.  "  The 
politics  of  the  day  are  all  wrong,"  Jack  declared.  "  They  are 
petty  in  their  aims  and  ignoble  in  their  purposes.  What  we 
want  are  higher  aims  and  loftier  ideals.  The  questions  on  which 
the  chosen  of  the  nation  waste  their  strength — what  are  they  ? 
Pitiful  matters  of  political  economy  and  domestic  detail.  Peo- 
ple rouse  themselves  to  tears  over  a  Turnpike  Bill,  and  allow 
the  moments  of  precious  life  to  perish  in  miserable  speculations 
of  Land  Reform.  We  should  have  something  goodlier  than  all 
this;  something  that  answers  more  truly  to  the  nobility  within 
us,  that  would  feed  more  fully  the  hunger  of  the  nation."  He 
paused  for  a  moment.  The  duke's  thin  lips  smiled  satyr-like; 
the  ex-colonial  governor  stared  ;  the  bishop  looked  bewildered  ; 
while  the  foreign  ambassador  seemed  to  be  reflecting  sadly  to 


\ 


THE  ESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT.  89 

himself  that,  after  all,  his  command  of  the  English  language 
was  not  so  extensive  as  he  had  fondly  believed  it  to  be.  Theoc- 
ritus broke  the  brief  silence.  "You  are  right/'  he  said;  "very 
right.  These  are  miserable  motives  for  politicians  to  squander 
their  strength  upon.  The  true  life  of  a  nation  lies  in  the  ideal 
to  which  it  i>ays  honor,  not  in  the  legislation  it  effects.  What 
is  the  value  of  a  County  Franchise  compared  with  a  refined 
sense  of  the  Beautiful  ?  Whether  Hodge  has  a  vote  or  not  is 
of  the  supremest  indifference  so  long  as  we  have  among  us  men 
who  can  do  honor  to  those  things  of  loveliness  the  world  has 
still  to  show.  Every  moment  that  passes  may  offer  us  some 
new  delight;  there  need  not  be  an  instant  of  our  waking  or 
sleeping  day  without  its  gracious  accompaniment  of  beauty. 
He  who  wakes  with  the  music  of  the  brown  bird  in  his  ears, 
and  who  wanders  forth  on  the  fair  lawns  in  ecstasy  of  delight  at 
its  strophes  and  anti-strophes  of  eternal  passion  and  eternal 
pain — what  is  it  to  him  whether  he  happens  to  be  a  compound 
householder  or  no?  He  has  the  wings  of  the  morning,  4nd  he 
is  indifferent  to  the  ten-pound  franchise.  These  are  questions 
for  peddlers,  not  for  statesmen." 

Jack  took  up  the  theme.  "  Happier  the  man  who  sits  staring 
long  hours  into  the  love-worn  eyes  of  our  Lady  Lisa,  or  goes 
a-wandering  in  the  wan  flower-stained  gardens  of  Sandro  Botti- 
ceUiv  where  the  nymphs  are  whose  limbs  are  lissom  with  love, 
than  the  poor  wretch  who  passes  a  degraded  life  in  poring  over 
Blue  Books,  and  whose  only  thoughts  of  woman  are  whether 
she  shall  not  have  the  ballot.  What  woman  wants  is  worship 
of  her  sovereign  and  supreme  beauty,  and  not  the  miserable 
privilege  of  thrusting  a  dirty  piece  of  paper  into  a  wooden 
box." 

V  But  all  women  are  not  beautiful,"  the  duke  dryly  interposed. 
• "  •*  All  true  women  are,"  Theocritus  interposed.  "  All  real 
women  must,  by  very  reason  of  their  being,  be  beautiful.  I 
never  admit  that  the  others  exist.  Ugly  women  are  but  phan- 
tasms.   I  shut  my  eyes  and  I  see  them  no  more." 


90  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

The  bishop  had  pretty  daughters;  the  colonial  governor  had 
a  pretty^vife;  so  they  both  smiled  good-humoredly.  As  for  the 
ambassador,  he  had  given  up  all  attempt  at  following  the  con- 
versation, and  was  framing  the  basis  of  a  new  treaty  between 
the  smoke-circles  of  his  cigar. 

"  We  want  a  new  departure  in  politics,"  said  Jack.  "  The 
loveliness  after  which  we  dream  should  be  m^de  the  possession 
of  the  world.  We  should  not  waste  our  time  in  commercial 
considerations — how  true  that  remark  of  the  Master  about  our 
indifference  as  to  whether  all  the  Titians  in  Europe  were  fash- 
ioned into  sand-bags ! — we  should  rather  teach  those  beneath 
us  the. immeasurable  meaning  of  beauty.  We  would  not  give 
the  people  freedom,  for  freedom  is  only  a  phflfee,  and  I  do  not 
love,  phrases;  but  m'c  would  give  them  beautiful  songs,  and 
splendid  pictures,  and  the  praises  of  fair  women,  and  set  their 
lives  to  very  music."  Jack  paused  for  breath,  and  Theocritus 
took  up  the  strain  after  the  fashion  of  the  shepherds  of  his  Sicil- 
ian namesake. 

'*  We  want  this  new  creed,"  he  said ;  *'  the  old  faiths  are  dead 
and  buried,  and  the  world  is  weary  of  their  unlaid  ghosts.  We 
have  outlived  the  religious  symbols  of  our  fathers,  and  can  only 
look  with  pain  on  pitiful  squabbles  about  the  establishment  or 
disestablishment  of  a  State  church.  You  might  as  well  ask  me 
to  take  concern  in  the  establishment  or  disestablishment  of 
Mumbo  Jumbo,  or  to  proclaim  myself  the  apostle  of  any  other 
mid- African  fetichry,  as  waste  one  thought  on  so  poor  a  matter. 
Had  we,  as  of  old,  a  grander  faith,  such  as  built  abbeys,  and 
painted  great  pictures,  in  which  men  limned  the  women  they 
loved,  to  be  adored  by  ignorant  crowds  as  saints — a  faith  that 
was  tilled  with  music  as  with  wine — the  thing  would  be  at  least 
worth  keeping  for  the  artistic  value  it  had.  But  alL  else  is 
absurd.  We  are  the  priests  of  a  new  faith,  and  we  will  preaclv 
it  even  to  martyrdom."  He  concluded  as  he  lit  another  of  the 
duke's  magnificent  cigars,  "If  ever  L  go  into  the  House  of 
Commons,  when  I  have  nothing  better  to  do,  I  shall  expound  \ 


THE  MSTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT.  9I 

my  meaning  to  the  world,  and  show  that  the  true  principles  of 
the  world  lie  in  the  combination  of  liberty  and  civilization." 

The  bishop,  who  had  shown  various  signs  of  indignation  dur- 
ing the  speech  of  Theocritus,  and  was  about  to  interrupt  him  at 
one  time  when  he  felt  the  restraining  hand  of  the  duke  upon 
his  arm.  here  rose  and  said  he  would  go  to  bed;  which  he  did, 
with  the  conviction  in  his  mind  that  his  grace  was  going  too  far 
in  bringing  such  extraordinary  people  to  Magdiel  Towers. 

"  Yes."  said  Jack,  when  the  bishop  had  departed,  "liberty  and 
civilization — these  shall  be  my  political  watchwords.  The  two 
now  exist  apart.  It  shall  be  ofirs  to  solder  close  these  im()ossi- 
bilities  and  make  them  kiss.  The  Liberal  party  represents  lib- 
erty, indeed,  in  its  crude  rough  way,  but  it  is  a  wholly  uncivil- 
ized liberty,  a  naked,  shameless  savage,  as  it  were.  The  Tory 
party,  on  the  other  hand,  have  civilization,  but  they  lack  the  true 
liberty  without  which  even  civilisation  loses  half  its  value.  When 
I  enter  political  life  it  will  be  to  combine  these  two  great  prin- 
ciples." 

The  duke  had  been  listening  to  the  last  part  of  the  young 
men's  speeches  with  the  closest  attention  and  a  curious  smile 
upon  his  wrinkled  face.  "  So  you  shall,"  he  said.  *•  Much  that 
you  have  said  has  impressed  me,  and  it  will  not  be  my  fault  if 
you  have  not  the  opportunity  of  fulfilling  your  mission.  If  I  do 
not  mistake  the  signs  of  the  times,  there  is  a  general  election 
close  at  hand.  Be  ready  when  I  call  upon  you  to  represent 
your  noble  ideas  in  the  senate  of  your  country." 

The  general  election  came  sooner  than  was  expected;  within 
a  very  few  days  of  this  conversation,  while  Jack  and  Theocritus 
were  still  guests  at  the  Towers,  and  before  the  duke  had  time 
either  to  forget  or  repent  of  his  resolution.  The  boroughs  of 
Magdiel  and  Iram  were  entirely  in  the  duke's  control,  for  they 
both  belonged  to  him,  and  he  could  have  returned  a  gorilla  for 
cither  of  them  if  he  had  chosen.  Jack  and  Theocritus  were  pro- 
posed as  candidates  by  the  duke's  agent,  and  as  of  course  no  one 
dreamed  of  contesting,  they  were  returned  without  opposition, 


g2  .*  T^S  LIBRARY  MAGAZIN'E. 

and  found  themselves  members  of  the  great"  new  Parliament 
before  they  had  time  to  master  thie  first  principles  of  the  law  of 
elections  as  set  forth  in  the  shilling  handbook  whicl^  Theocritus 
had  purchased  at  the  Magdiel  railway  station. 

What  was  the  reason  the  duke  had  in  returning  the  two  poets? 
He  had  a  grudge  against  the  preceding  Government,  which  was 
likely  to  come  in  again,  because  it  had  not  taken  sufficient  notice 
of  his  young  son.  Lord  Lotan.  Lord  Lotan  had  not  been  offered 
a  place  in  the  Ministry  that  went  out  three  years  before,  although 
the  Magdiels  had  been  consistent  supporters  of  the  party  from 
the  days  of  the  Long  Parliam^t,  and  his  name  had  not  been 
talked  of  for  the  new  Cabinet  which  had  been  so  often  discussed 
and  formed  in  fancy  long  before  the  threatened  appeal  to  the 
country  became  an  actual  fact.  So  the  duke  had  conceived  that 
it  would  be  exceedingly  amusing  to  harass  the  government  by 
sending  them  two  such  strange  supporters  as  Jack  Harris  and 
Theocritus  Marlowe.  The  idea  had  occurred  to  him  that  night 
in  the  smoking-room,  and  he  saw  the  opportunity  of  a  new 
amusement  in  the  idea  of  listening  from  the  peers'  gallery  to 
such  speeches  as  these  in  the  chamber  of  St.  Stephen's.  The 
duke  had  never  denied  himself  any  amusement  in  his  life,  and 
he  did  not  intend  to  on  this  occasion.  He  pictured  to  himself 
the  puzzle  that  the  aesthetic  ideas  of  his  prot6g6s  would  be  to  the 
Ministry,  and  he  sent  Jack  and  Thgbcritus  into  Parliament. 

There  was  considerable  flutter  among  the  aesthetics  when  the 
news  of  the  return  of  two  of  their  leaders  to  Parliament  became 
known,  and  many  were  the  efforts  which  their  friends  made  to 
see  the  pair  and  learn  the  solution  of  the  problem.  But  Jack 
and  Theocritus  had  assumed  the  airs  of  reserve  and  wisdom 
which  were  becoming  to  statesmen,  and  the  period  that  inter- 
vened between  the  election  and  the  meeting  of  Parliament  was 
passed  by  them  in  mysterious  seclusion.  Those  of  their  allies 
who  happened  to  see  them  or  hear  from  them  were  assured  that 
they  were  preparing  themselves  to  fight  for  their  cause.  Jack 
had  bought  a  copy  of  Sir  Erskine  May's  *  Parliamentary  Prac- 


/ 


THE  ^ESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT.  93 

tice,"  and  he  and  Theocritus  passed  long  hours  in  attentive  study 
of  its  pages. 

When  the  House  met.  Jack  and  Theocritus  were  among  the 
very  first  to  be  present.  Their  long  hair  floated  upon  their 
shoulders  in  picturesque  abandonment.  Jack  wore  a  wide  felt 
hat  that  framed  his  head  as  in  a  dusky  aureole,  and  his  form 
was  swathed  in  the  drooping  folds  of  a  Spanish  cloak ;  his  left 
hand  held  a  bunch  of  lilies.  Theocritus,  who  aflfected  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  wore  a  long  frock  coat  with  big  buttons,  that 
came  nearly  to  his  heels,  and  a  high  hat  of  the  sloping  type  dear 
to  the  Directory.  He  carried  a  heavy  gold-headed  cane,  and  in 
his  button-hole  a  single  red  tulip  "burned  like  love's  very  fkme," 
to  use  his  own  expression.  The  policemen  were  at  first  inclined 
to  bar  them  from  passing,  but  when  Jack  frowned  upon  them, 
and  Theocritus  exclaimed,  "  We  are  members  of  this  House,  we 
are  the  elect  Of  Magdiel  and  the  chosen  of  Iram,"  the  guar- 
dians let  them  go  by  without  further  protest.  Their  appearance 
in  the  inner  lobby  created  no  small  sensation  even  in  that  crowd 
of  newly  elected  members  busy  with  the  strange  business  of  a 
new  Parliament.  Members  of  the  new  Government  paused  in 
their  excited  hurryings  hither  and  thither  to  gaze  with  wonder 
upon  the  artistic  forms  who  stood  in  the  center  of  the  lobby 
discussing  together  their  plans  of  action.  Ex-ministers  for  a 
moment  forgot  their  woes  in  their  wonder  at  the  mystic  flower- 
bearers  who  conversed  together,  affecting  a  serene  unconscious- 
ness of  the  attention  that  was  filling  their  souls  with  keen  delight. 
"  Who  are  they  ?"  every  one  asked  of  every  one  else ;  and  when 
young  Lord  Lydgate,  who  represented  one  of  his  father's  pocket 
boroughs,  was  seen  to  rush  up  to  them  as  soon  as  he  saw  them 
in  the  lobby,  and  remain  in  deepest  consultation  with  the  twain, 
the  excitement  knew  no  bounds,  and  men  forgot  their  immedi- 
ate affairs  in  order  to  wait  till  Lord  Lydgate  was  free  to  ask  him 
who  his  wonderful  friends  were.  But  they  waited  in  vain. 
Lord  Lydgate  was  quite  delighted  to  find  his  poetic  friends  were 
ipembers  of  a  House  whose  membership  he  valued  very  litt^ 


94  THE  UBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

himselK  and  which  he  only  endured  to  please  his  father,  and  he 
was  rejoiced  at  the  opportunity  of  taking  Jack  and  Theocritus 
all  over  the  place  and  showing  and  explaining  everything  to 
them.  He  finally  conducted  them  to  the  smoking  room,  and 
over  dainty  cigarettes  they  discussed  the  future,  and  Lord  Lyd- 
gate  learned  from  the  lips  of  his  friends  the  formation  of  the 
new  party  of  liberty  and  civilization.  He  was  charmed  by  the 
propositions  of  the  poets,  wondered  he  had  never  thought  of- 
them  before  in  connection  with  a  parliamentary  career,  and 
before'the  talk  was  ended  he  was  a  complete  adherent  of  their 
views  and  a  sworn  follower  of  the  new  party. 

When  Jack  'and  Theocritus  had  taken  the  oaths — after  duly 
deciding  that  tftey  could  quite  reconcile  it  with  their  pagan  prin- 
ciple to  do  so — they  took  their  seats  at  once  on  the  front  bench 
below  the  gangway  on  the  ministerial  side  of  the  House,  one  on 
each  side  of  Lord  Lydgate.  Though  for  the  first  few  days,  on 
the  advice  of  Lord  Lydgate,  they  kept  a  discreet  silence,  and 
occupied  themselves  in  getting  the  way  of  the  place,  it  soon 
became  known  about  the  House  that  a  new  party  was  going 
through  the  process  of  formation,  and  that  it  was  to  be  spoken 
of  as  the  Fifth  party.  The  noble  lord  who  headed  the  Fourth 
party  eyed  the  new-comers  with  a  curious  interest,  as  if  he 
reserved  to  himself  the  right  of  absorbing  them  into  the  com- 
pany of  the  gentlemen  who  acted  with  him  if  they  proved  worthy 
of  the  honor;  while  the  Third  party  through  its  whips  made 
some  earnest  but  futile  efforts  to  elicit  the  opinion  of  the  stran- 
gers on  the  questions  of  Griffith's  valuation  and  Home  Rule^  As 
the  House  began  to  fill.  Jack  and  Theocritus  found  many  friends 
among  some  of  the  youthful  Liberals  and  Tories  whose  business 
in  life  is  the  putting  on  of  gorgeous  apparel.  These  they  had 
come  across  occasionally  at  afternoon  teas  and  garden  parties 
in  the  days  before  the  visit  to  Magdiel  Towers,  and  these  were 
very  ready  to  welcome  the  poets  to  the  House,  though  they 
could  not,  for  the  life  of  them,  imagine  how  the  deuce  they  got 
or  what  the  deuce  they  wanted  there. 


THE  ESTHETICS  IN  PARUAMENT.  95 

A  change  began  to  come  oyer  the  House  in  consequence  of 
the  presence  of  the  aesthetics.  The  lobbies  were  besieged  now 
by  picturesque  long-haired  youths  of  strange  attire,  who  were 
always  sending  in  their  names  for  Mr.  Harris  or  Mr.  Marlowe, 
and  who  had  generally  some  brilliant  ideas  to  propose  as  to  the 
means  by  which  the  new  principles  of  liberty  and  civilization — 
**  Lasenby  Liberty  and  civiliiation,"  a  scoffing  critic  styled  it — 
were  best  to  be  carried  out.  Deputations  from  the  Kyrle  Soci- 
ety and  other  bodies  of  kindred  purposes  waited  upon  the  mem- 
bers for  Magdiel  and  Iram  in  the  conference-room  and  broached 
plans  for  Government  subsidization  and  patronage.  Youthful 
painters  came  down  to  the  House,  with  huge  canvases  which 
had  been  rejected  by  miserable  hanging  committees,  in  order 
that  the  attention  of  the  Government  might  be  called  to  their 
case ;  and  youthful  poets,  with  huge  rolls  of  rejected  manu- 
scripts '*n  their  hands,  demanded  sternly  that  hostile  publishers 
should  be  brought  to  the  bar  of  the  House.  The  ladies'  gallery 
too  began  to  change  its  character  not  a  little ;  for  it  was  now 
always  besieged  by  strangely  clad  damsels  sad-eyed  and  disor- 
dered of  hair,  who  peered  through  the  grating  eagerly  on  the 
bench  where  Jack  and  Theocritus  sat,  and  murmured  softly  the 
while  some  lines  of  the  two  masters'  latest  lyrics.  In  the  gallery 
under  the  clock  the  chosen  friends  of  Jack  and  Theocritus  would 
sit  in  languid  attitudes,  with  bunches  of  flowers  in  their  hands, 
looking  with  dreamy  disdain  upon  all  save  the  three  who  cham- 
pioned art  in  Parliament.  Sometimes  these  youths  brought 
books  with  them — volumes  of  songs  inspired  by  a  sad  sensuality, 
with  which  they  sought  to  refresh  themselves  when  the  debate 
turned  upon  some  tedious  topic  connected  with  the  welfare  of 
the  mass  of  the  people  ;  but  these  studies  were  always  harshly 
interrupted  by  the  watchful  attendants,  to  the  great  disgust  of  the 
young  men,  who  declared  that  the  tyranny  of  the  time  was  really 
too  oppressive,  and  made  them  long  for  the  myrtle-clad  swords 
of  the  Grecian  comrades  whose  characters  were  at  least  in 
some  respects  very  dear  to  them.    One  fiery  soul — it  was  Heli- 


9^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZIiVE, 

ogabalus  Murdle — declared  one  day  in  a.  loud  tone  in  the  lob- 
by, to  an  admiring  group,  that  the  Speaker  ought  to  be  sent 
to  prison,  and  he  was  about  to  add  that  when  he  got  to  Par- 
liament he  would  see  it  done,  when  he  was  promptly  removed 
into  the  outer  air  by  Inspector  Denning;  and  it  was  with 
very  great  difficulty,  and  only  after  the  personal  interference 
of  Lord  Lydgate,  whose  family  commanded  several  votes  in 
another  place,  that  the  expelled  bard  was  allowed  to  enter  the 
sacred  precincts  again.  He  had,  however,  the  consolation  of 
figuring  as  a  martyr  in  his  circle,  especially  by  its  women,  by 
whom  he  was  regarded  as  a  sort  of  improved  copyof  Coriolanus, 
Dante,  and  Alcibiades  combined.  Jack  and  Theocritus  peopled 
the  smoking-room  with  their  friends,  who  smoked  innumerable 
cigarettes  and  talked  in  loud  tones  of  the  various  women  they 
honored  with  their  poetic  adoration,  and  murmured  to  each 
other  fragments  of  erotic  song,  which  had  the  effect  of  greatly 
horrifying  some  elderly  members  who  did  not  understand  the 
beauty  of  higher  culture.  Lord  Lydgate  liked  the  whole  thing 
immensely.  Up  to  this  time  he  had  had  nothing  to  do  in  the 
House  except  to  dress  himself  very  carefully  and  wander  about 
the  lobbies  with  a  simper  on  his  face  and  a  scented  handkerchief 
held  to  his  nose.  Now  he  found  his  time  fully  occupied,  and  he 
felt  that  he  was  a  person  of  importance.  The  two  members 
were  certainly  the  lions  of  the  hour,  and  Lord  Lydgate,  who  in 
his  vacuous  way  wanted  to  be  thought  clever,  fancied  that  he 
was  the  only  person  who  truly  appreciated  the  great  principles 
of  liberty  combined  with  civilization.  Jack  and  Theocritus 
assured  him  that  he  was  made  for  high  destinies,  and  alluded 
vaguely  to  the  necessity  that  would  be  his,  when  Prime  Minis- 
ter, of  being  a  master  of  all  the  principles  of  artistic  truth. 

The  new  party  were  quiet  for  some  little  time,  while  the  House 
was  struggling  through  some  business;  but  they  felt  that  it 
would  not  do  to  allow  too  much  time  to  pass  before  they  began 
the  great  campaign.  One  fateful  day,  therefore,  at  motion  time. 
Jack  Harris  rose  from  his  place  below  the  gangway,  and  gave 


THE  ESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT,  97 

notice  that  he  would  on  the  following  day  ask  the  Honorable  Gen- 
tleman the  Prime  Minister  if  he  was  aware  that  the  identity 
of  the  Laura  of  Petrarcha  was  still  an  unsettled  question  ;  and  if, 
in  view  of  the  great  importance  of  the  question,  and  the  necessity 
for  England  to  show  herself  eminent  in  striving  for  its  solution, 
he  would  appoint  a  select  committee  of  the  House  to  investigate 
the  matter.  Silence  held  the  astonished  Commons  for  some 
seconds  after  Jack  had  given  his  notice,  and  then  came  such  a 
shriek  of  laughter  as  has  seldom  disturbed  the  peace  of  the  Gothic 
chamber,  while  Jack  pulled  his  swart  sombrero  over  his  eyes, 
and  devoted  himself  to  the  study  of  a  mass  of  documents  in 
relation  to  the  great  question  he  had  just  propounded  to  the 
House.  Members  who  did  not  know  who  Jack  was,  asked  each 
other  if  the  member  for  Magdiel  was  mad,  or  if  a  silly  practical 
joke  was  intended ;  while  those  senators  who  had  been  favored 
through  Lord  Lydgate— who  had  constituted  himself  the  whip 
of  the  Fifth  party — with  the  views  of  Jack  and  Theocritus  on 
the  union  of  liberty  and  civilization,  explained  that  Mr.  Harris 
was  a  great  poet,  and  that  he  was  quite  in  earnest  about 
Petrarch's  Laura.  One  of  the  Government  whips  waited  on 
Jack,  whom  he  found  in  deep  consultation  with  Theocritus  and 
Lord  Lydgate  in  the  quietest  corner  of  the  smoking-room,  to 
inquire  if  he  really  intended  asking  the  question  of  which  he  had 
given  notice.  With  all  the  gravity  of  offended  statesmanship. 
Jack  assured  his  interrogator  that  he  certainly  did,  and  that  he 
considered  the  backwardness  of  England  in  these  matters  of 
research,  and  her  indifference  to  that  love  for  poetry  and  poets 
which  is  the  crown  of  a  great  country,  as  the  most  fatal  signs  of 
England's  degradation.  The  puzzled  whip  retired  to  inform  his 
chiefs  of  Jack's  determination,  and  the  three  friends  were  left  to 
finish  in  peace  a. scheme  they  were  drawing  up  for  awarding  a 
Government  prize  of  a  golden  apple  to  the  most  beautiful 
woman  every  year. 

Next  day  the  House  was  unusually  crowded  at  question  time, 
and  much  anxiety  was  felt  for  the  time  when  Jack's  question. 
L.  M.  8.-4 


98  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

which  stood  pretty  early  on  the  paper,  should-~be  reached.  At 
last  the  moment  came :  the  Speaker  called  Mr.  Harris,  and  Jack 
rose.  In  a  calm  tone  he  read  his  question  and  sat  down. ,  Amid 
shouts  of  laughter  the  Prime  Minister  immediately  rose  and 
advanced  to  the  table  with  a  countenance  which  his  efforts 
wholly  failed  to  render  grave.  He  fancied,  he  said,  that  the 
House  would  hardly  require  him  to  reply  at  any  great  length  to 
the  extraordinary  question  that  had  just  been  addressed  to  him 
(cheers  from  the  House,  and  counter-cheers  from  the  Fifth 
party) ;  he  would  not  like  to  attribute  anything  like  levity  to 
any  member  of  that  House  (*•  Hear,  hear,"  from  Lord  Lydgate), 
but  he  really  must  warn  his  young  friend  that  he  was  trifling 
with  the  temper  of  that  House  (great  cheering,  and  "  No,  no," 
from  Lord  Lydgate).  He  had  no  doubt  that  the  House  would 
see  in  the  youth  of  the  member  the  fittest  excuse  for  his  conduct 
(cries  of  "  Order,  order,"  and  "  Shame  "  from  Lord  Lydgate  and 
Mr.  Theocritus  Marlowe).  With  regard  to  the  question  itself, 
he  had  indeed  his  own  opinions,  founded  upon  a  pretty  long  and 
close  acquaintance  with  the  writings  of  the  great  Italian  poet, 
and  he  had  some  thought  at  a  leisure  opportunity  of  communi- 
cating his  ideas  to  the  world,  in  some  other  form.  But  he  must 
remind  the  honorable  member  that  topics  which  might  be  very 
appropriately  considered  in  the  pages  of  the  Nineteenth  Cen- 
tury were  hardly  to  be  considered  appropriate  to  the  House  of 
Commons,  which  he  must  request  the  honorable  member  to 
recollect  was  not  a  Dilettante  Society.  As  the  Prime  Minister 
sat  down  amidst  loud  cheers,  Jack  sprang  to  his  feet,  and  in  a 
somewhat  excited  tone,  but  with  perfectly  calm  manner, 
informed  the  Speaker  that,  in  consequence  of  the  peculiar 
nature  of  the  reply  of  the  Prime  Minister,  he  would  offer  some 
remarks,  and  would  conclude  with  a  motion.  The  scene  instantly 
became  one  of  indescribable  confusion;  members  shouting 
"  Order,  order  "  at  the  top  of  their  voice,  while  Jack  endeavored 
to  get  his  observations  heard  through  the  din. 
"  Mr.  Speaker,  the  matter  to  which  I  wish  the  attention  of  the 


THE  MSTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT.  99 

House  of  Commons  to  direct  itself  is  of  the  greatest  and  gravest 
importance  to  all  men  whose  intellects  have  passed  beyond  that 
of  the  primal  savage.  Only  a  mind  infected  by  malignity  or 
crippled  by  imbecility  could  fail  to  see,  with  clearness  of  very 
sunlight  at  noontide,  the  supreme  measure  of  fate-filled  neces- 
sity that  is  now  about  us  and  upon  us  to  divine  who  was  that 
most  precious  and  perfect  of  all  fair  and  radiant  women  whose 
name  the  loud  lips  of  Petrarch — golden-mouthed  indeed,  in 
truer  sense  than  any  saintship  of  them  all — had  done  honor  to 
in  verse  more  sweet  than  the  honey  which  drowned  that  melo- 
dious singer  of  old  Greece,  and  more  musical  in  its  very  oneness 
and  entirety  of  passion  than  the  tremulous  measures  of  Galuppi 
or  the  high  serenity  of  Margaritone  of  Arezzo."  Thus  far  had 
jack  got — thus  much,  at  least,  did  Theocritus,  who  was  taking 
notes,  make  up  of  what  he  was  trying  to  say— when  the  Speaker 
rose  and  quelled  the  storm  by  calling  the  honorable  member's 
attention  to  the  fact  that,  under  one  of  the  newest  of  the  new 
rules,  he  was  not  privileged  to  continue  his  observations.  Jack, 
who  had  been  pulled  down  by  Lord  Lydgate  when  the  Speaker 
got  up,  now  rose  on  a  whisper  from  his  whip,  and  announced 
that  he  would  on  a  future  occasion  draw  the  attention  of  the 
House  to  the  matter. 

If,  however,  the  House  imagined  the  spirit  of  the  Fifth  party 
was  broken  by  this  rebuff,  they  were  very  much  mistaken.  Jack 
and  Theocritus  soon  began  work  in  earnest.  Theocritus  set  the 
game  afoot  by  asking  the  Home  Secretary  if  he  would  lay  upon 
the  table  of  the  House  a  return  of  the  different  forms  of  sonnets 
practiced  by  poets  since  the  time  of  Dante  of  Majano.  Jack 
moved  for  a  commission  to  inquire  into  the  effect  of  European 
pigments  upon  Japanese  art.  Lord  Lydgate  recommended  to 
the  House  the  necessity  of  erecting  statues  to  Mr.  Burne  Jones, 
Pico  Delia  Mirandula,  and  Walt  Whitman,  in  Palace  Yard. 
Theocritus  moved  that  St.  Just's  laws  relating  to  friendship  be 
incorf>orated  in  the  English  Constitution.  In  Committee  of 
Sui^lyone  day.  Jack  rose  and  gravely  moved  that  the  Chairman 

646357 


lOO  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

do  leave  the  chair,  and  proceeded  to  "point  out  that  his  reasons 
for  doing  so  were  in  order  to  show  that  he  had  some  dot^bts  as 
to  the  genuineness  of  a  Mantegna  which  had  just  been  acquired 
by  the  National  Gallery,  and  which  Jack  was  inclined  to  believe 
was  in  reality  from  the  brush  of  Francia.  He  made  some  very 
eloquent  remarks  on  the  subject  and  on  art. in  general,  and 
was  called  several  times  to  order;  and  being. threatened  with 
being  named,  sat  down  after  his  motion.  The  Chairman  put 
the  question  **  that  1  do  now  leave  the  chair :  those  who  are  for 
the  motion  say  *  Aye ' "  ("  Aye  "  said  Jack),  "  the  contrary  '  No  '  " 
(an  angry  yell  of  **  No  "  from  all  parts  of  the  House).  "  I  think 
the  noes  have  it,"  said  the  Chairman  sternl)'.  "  The  ayes  have 
it,"  shouted  Jack.  "  Strangers  must  withdraw,"  said  the  Chair- 
man. The  bell  rang,  and  members  trooped  in,  wondering  what  on 
earth  the  unexpected  division  was  about ;  a  matter  on  which  the 
bewildered  whips  were  scarcely  better  able  to  inform  them.  When 
the  period  of  probation  had  expired,  the  Chairman  again  put  the 
question  with  the  same  result,  and  his  expression  of  opinion 
tnat  the  noes  have  it  was  again  challenged  by  the  Honorable 
Member  for  Magdicl.  "  Does  the  honorable  gentleman  name  a 
teller?"  inquired  the  Chairman  of  Committees  sternly,  and  with 
a  half-hope  that  he  would  not  do  so.  But  Jack  was  equal  to  the 
occasion,  and-  promptly  named  Theocritus.  The  Chairman 
shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  The  ayes  to  the  right,  noes  to  the 
le  t,"  he  said.  "  Tellers  for  the  ayes,  Mr.  Theocritus  Marlowe 
and  Lord  Lydgate,  tellers  for  the  noes.  Lord  Richard  Grosvenor 
and  Lord  Kensington."  When  the  division  was  taken.  Jack  was 
defeated  by  a  majority  of  about  four  hundred  as  against  his 
solitary  vote  on  the  great  Mantegna  question. 

The  next  step  taken  by  the  party  was  to  improve  the  laws  of 
England  by  a  gallant  attempt  to  add  to  the  statute-book  a 
measure  of  their  own.  Jack  pnt  down  his  name  to  bring  in  a 
bill  for  the  revival  and  formation  of  the  Courts  of  Love  in  Eng- 
land. This  measure  Jack  had  printed  like  a  parliamentary 
paper,  and  issued  it  to  all  his  friends — a  circumstance  which  for- 


THE  ESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT,  lOI 

tunately  enables  us  to  reproduce  it  here,  as  it  never  came  to  its 
first  reading.  The  bill,  which  was  called  "  The  Courts  of  Love 
(Eiigland)  Bill,"  and  which  bore  on  its  back  the  names  of  John 
Harris,  Theocritus  Marlowe,  and  Lord  Lydgate,  ran  as  fol- 
lows: 

"  Be  it  enacted  by  the  Queen's  Most  Excellent  Majesty,  by  and 
with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Lords  Spiritual  and  Tem- 
poral, and  Commons  in  the  present  Parliament  assembled,  and 
by  the  authority  of  the  same,  as  follows : 

"(I.)  That  certain  Courts,  Parliaments,  or  Tribunals  shall  be 
established  throughout  England  to  be  used  and  applied  as  courts 
of  judgment  and  award  in  all  cases  connected  with  the  affairs  of 
love  that  may  be  brought  before  it. 

"  (2.)  That  the  jurisdiction  of  the  aforesaid  Courts,  Parlia- 
ments, or  Tribunals  shall  only  extend  in  cases  where  such  judg- 
ment is  voluntarily^  appealed  to  by  all  persons  concerned,  but 
that  in  such  cases  its  jurisdiction  shall  6c  binding. 

"(3.)  That  the  principles  which  regulate  the  actions  of  the 
aforesaid  Courts  shall  be  based  upon  the  rules  of  Andr6  Le 
Chappelain,  Geoffrey  Chaucer,  and  others,  as  compiled  by  a 
commission  to  be  composed  of  the  Members  in  charge  of  this 
Bill." 

At  last  the  climax  came.  One  night  in  Committee,  Jack  rose 
and  moved  that  the  estimates  be  reduced  by  the  salary  of  the 
Governor  of  the  Mint,  on  the  ground  that  the  coinage  of  Eng- 
land was  hideous  in  the  extreme  and  called  for  immediate 
improvement. 

"  In  a  well-governed  country,"  he  argued,  "  everything  should 
be  beautiful,  from  the  houses  wherein  we  dwell  to  the  coins 
wherewith  we  traffic  with  our  fellows,  and  which  we  are  so  often 
compelled  to  touch  and  gaze  upon."  He  proceeded  at  consid- 
erable length  to  dwell  upon  the  exceeding  loveliness  of  Greek 
coins,  and  to  urge  upon  the  Ministry  the  real  necessity  for  intro- 
ducing a  coinage  the  use  of  which  would  infallibly  inculcate  the 
true  principles  of  beauty  in  the  minds  of  all  classes.    "  The  busir 


102  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

ness  of  money  is  not  alone  for  the  purposes  of  trade,"  Jack 
explained.  "True  money  is  intensely  symbolic,  and  every  coin 
which  has  to  pass  through  our  hands  should  awaken  a  flood  of 
wonderful  associations.  And  what  are  the  considerations  which 
deprive  us  of  this.'* — The  basest  considerations  of  convenience. 
PvOple  tell  me  that  it  is  more  convenient  for  coins  to  be  round,* 
that  they  are  troublesome  to  count  if  they  are  in  high  relief,  and 
that  they  should  be  as  light  as  possible.  Absurd!  what^  has 
convenience  to  do  with  the  matter?  Our  gold  coins  should  be 
marvels  of  subtle  workmanship,  exquisitely  suggestive  of  the 
higher  ideal.  Let  us  revive  for  to-day  the  images  of  old  Greece, 
the  deities  whose  forms  remain  forever  imperishable  in  marble. 
In  place  of  the  meaningless  absurdities  which  now  desecrate 
our.  coinage,  let  the  heads  of  our  loveliest  women  be  graven 
upon  it  by  our  greatest  craftsmen,  that  their  grace  may  be  known 
wherever  the  commerce  of  England  extends,  and  their  sweet 
memory  be  made  perpettial."  Here  Jack  was  interrupted  by  the 
leader  of  the  Opposition,  who  asked  if  the  honorable  member 
was  in  order  in  thus  introducing  the  question  of  coinage  into 
the  debate.  The  Chairman  said  that  he  could  not  actually  con- 
vict the  honorable  member  of  being  out  of  order,  but  that  he 
was  certainly  taxing  the  patience  of  the  House  very  severely. 
Jack  sternly  replied  that  the  House  must  learn  patience,  and 
that  he  would  not,  while  the  cause  of  art  was  at  stake,  suffer 
dictation  from  any  miserable  Philistine  Here  several  members 
rose  to  order,  and  one  member  of  the  Government  moved  tha,t 
the  words  of  the  speaker  be  taken  down.  The  Chairman  asked 
the  honorable  member  if  he  applied  the  phrase  **  miserable 
Philistine  "  to  any  member  of  that  House.  Jack  observed  firmly 
that  he  was  unavoidably  compelled  to  apply  it  to  every  member 
of  that  House  who  did  not  agree  with  him  ;  an  observation  that 
was  greeted  with  shouts  of  anger  from  the  House  and  indignant 
cheers  from  Theocritus  and  Lord  Lydgate.  The  Chairman  rose 
and  called  upon  the  honorable  member  iox  Magdiel  to  with- 
draw the  expression.    Jack^  folding  his  arms  and  looking  pale- 


THE  ^Sl^ffETlCS  IN  PARLIAMENT,  \0% 

but  determined,  declined  to  db  so.  The  Chairman  in  conse- 
qiience  said  sadly,  **  I  najne  you,  Mr.  Harris,"  and  the  leader  of 
the  Ministry  immediately  rose  and  moved  that  the  member  be 
suspended.  The  division  was  defiantly  challenged  by  the  Fifth 
party,  but  the  solitary  vote  they  were  able  to  record  against  the 
overwhelming  majority  of  the  House  did  not  save  Jack  Harris 
from  being  solemnly  suspended.  When  the  numbers  were  read, 
therefore,  and  the  shouts  of  laughter  which  greeted  them  had 
died  away,  the  Chairman  called  on  Jack  Harris  to  withdraw. 
Jack,  however,  who  had  held  a  hurried  consultation  with  his 
friends,  declined  to  do  so  until  the  Sergeant-at-arms  was  sent 
for.  As  the  hand  of  Captain  Gossett  fell  upon  his  shoulder,  the 
honorable  member  for  Magdiel  rose,  and,  folding  his  arms  scorn- 
fully, declared  that  he  was  glad  to  suffer  martyrdom  in  so  good 
a  cause.  He  then  strode  sternly  out  of  the  House.  Theocritus 
Marlowe  immediately  rose  to  protest  against  the  shameless  tyr- 
anny to  which  his  honorable  friend  had  been  subjected.  He 
likened  the  Prime  Minister  to  a  second-hand  Cicero  paltering 
with  treachery.  He  was  immediately  called  to  order  by  a  youth- 
ful Liberal  lord  who  had  just  returned  from  a  diplomatic  mission 
to  the  East,  and  was  summoned  by  the  chairman  to  withdraw 
the  phrase.  "  I  refuse,"  thundered  Theocritus, "  to  withdraw  any 
phrase  at  the  dictates  of  a  tyrant."  He  was  immediately  named, 
a  division  was  once  more  challenged,  and  in  his  turn  Theocritus 
was  summoned  to  withdraw.  Theocritus  rose  :  "  It  has  been  the 
misfortune  of  all  great  men  to  be  persecuted,"  he  said.  "  What 
Florence  did  to  Dante,  what  Athens  to  Socrates,  what  Rome  to 
Ovid,  Westminster  does  to-day  to  me.  But  I  will  not  stir  until 
I  am  dragged  at  the  dictates  of  despotism  from  the  altar  of 
liberty."  He  sat  down  and  pressed  his  lips  fervently  to  the  tulip 
he  habitually  carried  in  his  hand,  while  the  House  howled  with 
laughter,  and  Lord  Lydgate  hear-hear'd  vigorously.  When  the 
Sergeant-at-arms  appeared,  Theocritus  rose,  and,  shaking  his 
tulip  at  Mr.  Playfair,  went  to  join  his  friend,  who  was  waiting 
for  him  outside  in  an  attitude  of  Earl^'^-Italian  martyrdom,  and 


I04  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

the  two  went  to  the  play  together  to  Worship  the  fair  actress  who 
was  the  star  of  aestheticism. 

The  next  day,  however.  Jack  and  Theocritus  were  free  to 
return  to  the  service  of  the  House.  There  was  a  look  of  omi* 
nous  calm  upon  their  features  which  ought  to  have  alarmed  the 
unconscious  Ministry.  There  was  a  lengthy  consultation  with 
Lord  Lydgate  in  the  morning,  and  it  was  evident  that  the  Fifth 
party  were  not  crushed.  Some  rumor  of  coming  wonders  must 
have  got  abroad,  for  the  House  wa,s  crowded  with  the  worshipp- 
ers of  higher  culture  and  the  devotees  of  the  intense,  who  per- 
meated the  lobbies  and  besieged  the  galleries.  Fair  women 
looked  down  eagerly  from  behind  their  railings  upon  the 
crowded  chamber,  where  the  terrible  three  sat  in  their  familiar 
places. 

When  the  questions  had  come  to  an  end  Jack  suddenly  rose. 
•'  Mr.  Speaker,"  he  said,  "  I  move  that  this  House  do  now 
adjourn.  The  reason  for  which  I  do  so  is,  that  I  wish  to  criticise 
the  conduct  of  the  Ministry  in  their  shameless  attack  upon  me 
and  my  friend  last  night,  for  which  I  intend  to  move  that  a 
vote  of  censure  be  passed  upon  them."  Here  the  House  began 
to  shout  at  Jack,  who  went  on  through  all  the  clamor  with 
observations  from  which  some  fragments  about  "miserable 
despotism,"  **  sacred  cause  of  art,"  were  caught.  Members  were 
rising  to  right  and  left  and  front  of  him  shouting  for  order,  but 
Jack  refused  to  sit  down,  though  the  Speaker  rose.  The  Speaker 
sat  down,  and  the  Prime  Minister,  rising  to  his  feet,  moved  that 
the  member  for  Magdiel  be  no  longer  heard.  The  Speaker 
instantly  put  the  question,  which  was  of  course  carried,  but  Jack 
calmly  defied  the  decision  of  the  House  by  springing  up  and 
going  on  with  his  denunciations  of  the  Philistine  Ministry.  The 
Speaker  ordered  him  to  leave  the  chamber,  which  Jack  refused 
to  do.  Whereupon  the  Sergeant-at-arms  again  made  his  appear- 
ance. Before  the  display  of  force  a  second  time  Jack  yielded 
and  was  removed.    Theocritus  felt  that  all  eyes  were  on  him. 


THE  AESTHETICS  IN  PARLIAMENT.  IO5 

He  rushed  to  the  middle  of  the  House,  and  declared  that  the 
proceedings  were  infamous  and  cowardly.  He  was  promptly 
removed.  After  a  rapid  consultation,  the  offending  members,  in 
spite  of  a  protest  from  Lord  Lydgate,  were  ordered  to  be  con- 
fined in  the  Clock  Tower  during  the  pleasure  of  the  House- -an 
order  which  was  immediately  carried  out. 

The  Home  Secretary  penned  an  indignant  letter  to  the  Duke 
of  Magdiel,  reproaching  him  for  sending  such  representatives  to 
Parliament,  an  epistle  which  greatly  delighted  the  venerable 
peer.  He  felt,  however,  that  things  had  gone  far  enough.  The 
next  day  he  left  Magdiel  Towers  and  visited  his  friends  in  their 
prison.  He  found  Jack  and  Theocritus  sitting  by  the  fire  after 
breakfast  smoking  cigarettes.  Jack  had  a  piece  of  paper  on  his 
knees,  from  which  he  was  jotting  down  the  idea  for  a  sonnet  to 
be  called  "  Prison  Thoughts,"  and  Theocritus  was  reading  Mr. 
Pater's  essays  to  himself  in  a  low  tone.  A  little  pile  of  visiting- 
cards  showed  that  the  tedium  of  prison  life  had  not  been  unre- 
lieved. The  duke  had  a  long  consultation  with  them.  He  urged 
them  to  resign.  This  the  two  honorable  members  firmly  declined 
to  do.  During  the  conference  Lord  Lydgate  came  in.  He  had  been 
discussing  the  question  with  the  Liberal  whips.  If  the  offending 
members  would  apologize  to  the  House  they  would  be  forgiven. 
At  last  a  compromise  was  arrived  at.  Jack  and  Theocritus 
agreed  to  apologize  and  return  to  their  places.  They  would 
hold  their  seats  a  little  longer  to  sustain  their  dignity,  and  would 
then  resign,  if  the  duke  would  use  his  influence  with  the  Min- 
i^ry  to  get  them  some  comfortable  Government  appointment. 
The  programme  was  carried  out.  Jack  and  Theocritus  apolo- 
gized to  the  House  and  were  immediately  released.  Some  little 
time  later  they  both  applied  for  the  Chiltern  Hundreds  on  the 
plea  that  their  health  required  change  of  air.  When  their  appli- 
cation was  granted,  they  went  to  Italy  for  some  months.  On 
their  return  they  received  places  in  the  Education  Ofiice.  Mag- 
diel and  Iram  are  now  represented  by  a  younger  son  of  advanced 


I06  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

ideas  and  a  steady-going  Liberal  linen-draper.     The  first  vacant 
place  in  the  Ministry  was  offered  to  the  duke's  son,  Lord  Lotan. 

Justin  H.  McCarthy,  in  Belgravia. 


A  DAY  WITH  LISZT  IN  1880. 

Franz  Liszt  is  one  of  the  few  living  representatives  of  that 
great  upheaval  of  ideas  kpown  as  the  Romantic  movement  of 
1830. 

Abroad  the  new  aspirations,  cramped  in  politics,  found  their 
solace  and  ideal  fulfillment  in  the  realms  of  literature  and  of  art. 
The  names  of  George  Sand,  Alfred  de  Musset,  M.  Lamartine, 
and  Hugo ;  of  De  Lamennais  in  religion ;  of  Chopin,  Liszt,  Ber- 
lioz, Wagner  in  music,  are  but  so  many  expressions  of  that  sup- 
pressed excitement  of  new  life  which  found  its  chief  vent  in 
literature  and  art  on  the  Continent,  and  gave  us  a  new  burst  of 
painting  and  poetry,  and  the  Reform  Bill,  in  England. 

The  new  spirit,  the  ••  Zeitgeist,"  the  young  Impulse,  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  now  grown  to  maturity,  was  then  abroad  and 
busy  in  overturning  kingdoms  and  theories  of  art,  philosophy, 
and  religion  with  rigorous  impartiality. 

There  are  few  survivals  of  that  stirring  and  romantic  epoch. 
Liszt  is  amongst  them.  Once  the  idol  of  every  capital  in  the 
civilized  world  as  an  executive  musician,  he  was  placed  years 
ago  on  an  unapproachable  pedestal. 

Few  amongst  us  even  who  have  reached  middle  life  have 
heard  him  play;  he  belongs  to  the  epoch  of  Paganini,  Malibran, 
and  Lablache — not  to  the  epoch  of  Titiens,  Joachim,  and  Rubin- 
stein. To  have  heard  him  is  to  have  heard  a  man  who  in  the 
beginning  of  this  century  as  completely  transformed  the  school 
of  pianoforte-playing  as  did  Paganini  the  school  of  violin-playing. 
The  Liszt  method  has  profoundly  influenced  even  the  severer 


A  DA  Y   WITH  LISZT  IN  1880.  10/ 

clique  of  classical  experts  in  Grermany ;  and  the  greatness  and 
foresight  of  Liszt  is  evidenced  in  the  fact  that  no  pianoforte 
development  since  has  in  the  least  outgrown  the  impulse  given 
it  by  him  nearly  fifty  years  ago;  nor  as  executants  can  even 
Rubinstein  or  Billow  claim  to  have  done  more  than  offer  suc- 
cessive illustrations  of  the  great  master's  method  and  manner. 

As  I  drove  through  the  groves  of  olives  brightening  with 
crude  berries  that  clothe  the  slopes  of  Tivoli,  and  entered  the 
gateway  which  leads  up  to  the  ducal  Villa  d'Este,  it  was  with 
something  of  the  feeling  of  a  pilgrim  who  approaches  a  shrine. 
Two  massive  doors  open  on  to  a  monastic  cloister,  and  tlie 
entrance  to  the  villa  itself  is  out  of  the  cloisters,  just  as  the 
rooms  are  entered  from  the  cloister  of  Trinity  College,  Cam- 
bridge. 

Here  for  six  years  past  in  the  autumn  Liszt  has  led  a  retired 
life,  varied  by  occasional  excursions  to  Rome. 

I  was  conducted  up  a  staircase  which  opened  on  to  a  lofty 
terrace,  and  thence  into  a  side  room,  whilst  the  Swiss  valet  dis- 
appeared to  summon  the  Abbate  Liszt.  In  another  moment  I 
saw  a  side  door  open,  and  the  venerable  figure  of  Liszt,  already 
for  years  engraven  on  my  heart,  advanced  towards  me. 

It  was  the  same  noble  and  commanding  form — with  the  large 
finely  chiseled  features,  the  restless  glittering  eye  still  full  of 
untamed  fire,  the  heavy  white  hair,  thick  mantling  on  the  brow 
and  cropped  square  only  where  it  reached,  the  shoulders,  down 
which  1  can  well  imagine  it  might  have  continued  to  flow  un- 
checked like  a  snowy  cataract. 

He  came  forw^ard  with  that  winning  smile  of  bonhomie  which 
at  once  invites  cordiality,  and  drew  me  to  him  with  both  hands, 
conducting  me  at  once  into  a  little  inner  sitting-room  with  a 
window  opening  on  to  the  distant-  Campagna.  n 

The  room  was  dark,  and  completely  furnished  with  deep  red 
d^unask— cool  and  shadowy  contrast  to  the  burning  sunshine  of 


I08  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Italy.  After  alluding  to  our  last  meeting  in  Wagner's  house  at 
Bayreuth,  which  recalled  also  the  name  of  Walter  Bache,  who 
has  worked  so  bravely  for  Liszt's  music  in  England,  he  said, 
**  Now  tell  me,  how  is  Bache  ?  I  have  a  particular,  quite  partic- 
ular, regard  for  Bache ;  he  stayed  with  me  here  some  years  ago, 
and  he  has  been  very  steadfast  in  presenting  my  works  in  Eng;- 
land;  and  tell  me,  how  is  Victor  Hugo?  and  have  you  seen 
Renan  lately  ?"  I  was  overwhelmed  by  these  inquiries  and  the 
like.  I  could  not  give  him  very  good  accounts  of  M.  Hugo, 
whose  health  I  feared  was  declining;  but  I  said  that  the  last 
evening  I  had  spent  with  him  in  Paris  he  had  received  up  to 
twelve  at  night,  and  seemed  full  of  life;  although  his  hours  are 
much  earlier  now.  Of  M.  Renan  I  could  of  course  speak 
much  more  full}',  as  he  had  so  recently  been  in  England, 
"  Renan  took  me  to  M.  Hugo's  when  I  was  in  Paris,  and  we  had 
a  delightful  evening,"  he  remarked.  After  asking  after  a  few 
other  personal  friends,  he  said,  "  I  am  glad  to  see  you  here.  At 
this  time  I  have  a  little  more  leisure.  I  escape  to  this  retreat 
for  rest.  At  Rome  I  am  besieged  (obsede) by  all  sorts  of  people, 
with  whom  I  do  not  care  to  entertain  particular  relations — why 
should  I  ?  what  have  we  in  common  ? — they  come  out  of  curi- 
osity to  stare,  that  is  all ;  and  even  here  I  am  worried  with 
callers,  who  have  no  interest  for  me;"  and  indeed  it  was  current 
in  Rome  that  the  Abbate  Liszt  would  receive  no  one  at  Tivoli ; 
and  especially  ladies  were  not  admitted. 

I  could  not  help  admiring  the  situation  of  the  Villa  d'Este. 
"  Indeed,"  said  Liszt,  *' this  is  quite  a  princely  residence;  it  is 
rented  by  the  Cardinal  Hohenlohe,  with  whom  I  have  had  very 
old  and  friendly  relations ;  he  is  good  enough  to  apportion  it  to 
me  in  the  autumn ;  you  see  his  picture  hangs  there.  The  place 
is  quite  a  ruin.  It  belongs  to  the  Duke  of  Modena,  but  of 
course  they  cannot  keep  it  up  now;  the  Cardinal  spent  about 
£2,000  to  make  it  habitable.  You  shall  see  presently,  the  ter- 
races are  rather  rough ;  I  don't  often  go  about  the  place,  but  I 
will  come  out  with  you  now  and  show  you  some  points  of <  view. 


A  DAY   WITH  LISZT  IN  1880.  IO9 

I  lunch  about  one  o'clock;  you  will  stay  and  put  up  with  the 
hospitalite  cie  gargon." 

He  then  led  me  to  the  window.  Down  the  slope  of  a  precipi- 
tous mountain  stretched  the  Villa  d'Este  gardens;  tall  cypress 
trees  marked  the  line  of  walk  and  terrace ;  groves  of  olive,  be- 
tween which  peeped  glittering  cascades  and  lower  parterres, 
studded  here  and  there  with  a  gleaming  statue,  and  tall  jets  of 
water,  eternally  spouting,  fed  from  the  Marcian  springs ;  the 
extremity  of  the  park  seems  to  fade  away,  at  an  immense  depth, 
into  the  billowy  Campagna. 

It  was  like  an  enchanted  scene ;  from  the  contemplation  of 
which  I  was  roused  by  the  Abbate  taking  my  arm,  and,  passing 
through  several  ante-chambers,  we  emerged  on  to  the  raised 
terrace,  which  commanded  one  of  the  most  striking  views  in 
Italy,  or  the  world. 

"  Round  to  the  left,"  said  Liszt,  "  lies  Hadrian's  Villa,  and 
perhaps  your  eyes  are  good  enough  to  see  St.  Peter's  yonder  in 
the  horizon."  The  gray  mist  hung  at  a  distance  of  eighteen 
miles  over  the  straggling  buildings  of  distant  Rome;  but  they 
gleamed  out  here  and  there.  Beyond  these  wooded  flanks  of 
the  mountain ;  beyond  the  ruins  of  villas  where  Maecenas  and 
Horace  and  the  Antonines  held  their  revels;  beyond  the 
rushing  murmur  of  cascades  and  fountains;  never  silent,  yet 
ever  maAcing  a  low  and  slumberous  melody,  lay  the  Campagna 
like  a  vast  lake,  over  which  the  shadow  of  cloud  and  the  flicker 
of  sunlight  swept  and  faded  out;  and  again  beyond  the  Cam- 
pagna loomed  the  Eternal  City,  with  its  mighty  dome. 

We  seemed  lifted  into  the  upper  air,  as  on  the  spacious  sum- 
mit of  a  lofty  precipice ;  the  dry  vine  leaves  hung  about,  the 
trelilsed  parapets,  and  the  Virginian  creeper  was  just  begin- 
ning to  turn. 

Liszt  was  silent.  As  I  looked  at  the  noble  and  expressive 
features,  never  quite  in  repose,  and  strongly  marked  with^  the 
traces  of  those  immense  emotions  which  have  been  embodied 
by  him  in  his  great  orchestral  preludes,  and  thundered  by  him 


IIO  .     THE  LIBRARY,  MAGAZINE. 

through  every  capital  in  Europe,  in  the  marvelous  perform- 
ances of  his  earlier  days,  I  could  not  hielp  saying,  "  If  you  do 
not  find  rest  here  you  will  find  rest  nowhere  on  earth :"  -it  was 
indeed  a  realm  of  unap{)roachabIe  serenity  and  peace.  Then 
we  descended  by  winding  ways,  pausing  in  the  long  walk,  thickly 
shaded  with  olive  trees  and  beloved  ilex,  where  fifty  lions'  heads 
spout  fifty  streams  into  an  ancient  moss-grown  tank. 

"It  is,"  said  Liszt,  "a  retreat  for  summer:  yoii  can  walk  all 
day  about  these  grounds  and  never  fear  the  sun — all  is  shade. 
But  come  down  lower;"  and  so  we  went,  at  times  turning  round 
to  look  down  an  avenue,  or  catch,  through  the  trees,  a  peep  of 
the  glowing  horizon  beyond. 

Presently  we  came  to  a  central  space,  led  into  by  four  tall 
cypress  groves.  Here,  up  from  a  round  sheet  of  water  in  front 
of  us,  leaped  four  jets  to  an  immense  height ;  and  here  we  rested, 
whilst  the  Abbate  gave  me  some  account  of  this  Villa  or  Cha- 
teau d'Este.  and  its  former  owners,  which  differed  not  greatly 
from  what  may  be  found  in  most  guide-books. 

As  we  reascended,  the  bell  of  Sta.  Croce,  in  the  tall  cam- 
panile over  the  cloisters  which  form  part  of  the  Villa  d'Este, 
ran^  out  a  quarter  to  one. 

It  was  a  bad  bell,  like  most  Italian  bells,  and  I  naturally 
alluded  to  the  superiority  of  Belgian  bells  above  all  others. 
Rather  to  my  surprise  Liszt  said,  "  Yes,  but  how  are  they 
played  ?  I  remember  being  much  struck  by  the  Antwerp  caril- 
lon." I  described  to  him  the  mechanism  of  the  carillon  clavecin 
and  tambour,  and  reminded  him  that  the  Antwerp  carillon  was 
much  out  of  tune,  Bruges  being  superior,  as  well  as  of  heavier 
caliber,  and  Mechlin  bearing  off  the  palm  for  general  excellence. 
We  stopped  short  on  one  of  the  terraces,  and  he  seemed  much 
interested  with  a  description  I  gave  him  of  a  performance  by 
the  great  carilloneur  M.  Denyn  at  Mechlin,  and  which  remioijed 
me  of  Rubinstein  at  his  best.  He  expressed  surprise  when 
alluded  to  Van  den  Gheyn's  compositions  for  bells,  laid  out  like 
regular  fugues  and  organ  voluntaries,  and  equal  in  their  way  t< 


ce  ^ 


r 


A   DAV    WITH  LISZT  IN  1880.  HI 

Bach  or  Handel,  who  were  contemporaries  of  the  great  Belgian 
organist  and  carilloneur.  "But,"  he  said,  "the  Dutch  have 
also  good  bells.  I  was  once  staying  with  the  King  in  Holland, 
and  I  believe  it  was  at  Utrechf  that  I  heard  some  bell  music 
which  was  quite  wonderful."  I  have  listened  myself  to  that 
Utrecht  carillon,  which  is  certainly  superior,  and  is  usually  well 
handled. 

We  had  again  reached  the  upper  terrace,  where  the  Abbate's 
mid-day  repast  was  being  laid  out  by  his  valet.  It  was  a  charm- 
ing situation  for  lunch,  commanding  that  wide  and  magnificent 
prospect  to  which  I  have  alluded ;  but  autumn  was  far  advanced, 
there  was  a  fresh  breeze,  and  the  table  was  ordered  indoors. 
Meanwhile,  Liszt  laying  his  hand  upon  my  arm,  we  passed 
through  the  library,  opening  into  his  bed-room,  and  thence  to  a 
little  sitting-room  (the  same  which  commanded  that  view  of  the 
Campagna),  Here  stood  his  grand  Erard  piano.  "  As  we  were 
talking  of  bells,"  he  said,  "  I  should  like  to  show  you  an  *  Ange- 
lus '  which  I  have  just  written ;"  and  opening  the  piano,  he  sat 
down.  This  was  the  moment  which  I  had  so  often  and  so 
vainly  longed  for. 

When  I  left  England,  it  seemed  to  me  as  impossible  that  I 
should  ever  hear  Liszt  play,  as  that  I  should  ever  see  Mendels- 
sohn, who  has  been  in  his  grave  for  thirty-three  years.  How 
few  of  the  present  generation  have  had  this  privilege !  At  Bay- 
reuth,  I  had  hoped,  but  no  opportunity  offered  itself,  and  it  is 
well  known  that  Liszt  can  hardly  ever  be  prevailed  upon  to  open 
the  piano  in  the  presence  of  strangers.  A  favorite  pupil,  Polig, 
who  was  then  with  him  at  Villa  d'Este,  told  me  he  rarely 
touched  the  piano,  and  that  he  himself  had  seldom  heard  him — 
"  but,"  he  added  with  enthusiasm,  "  when  the  master  touches 
the  keys,  it  is  always  with  the  same  incomparable  effect,  unlike 
any  one  else :  always  perfect." 

"You  know,"  said  Liszt,  turning  to  me,  "they  ring  the 
•  Angelus '  in  Italy  carelessly ;  the  bells  swing  irregularly,  and 
tve  oft  and  the  cadences  are  often  broken  up  thus ;"  and  be- 


112  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

gan  a  little  swaying  passage  in  the  treble^ike  bells  tossing 
high  up  in  the  evening  air :  it  ceased,  but  so  softly  that  the  half- 
bar  of  silence  made  itself  felt,  and  the  listening  ear  still  carried 
the  broken  rhythm  through  the. pause.  The  Abbate  himself 
seemed  to  fall  into  a  dream  ;  his  fingers  fell  again  lightly  on  the 
keys,  and  the  bells  went  on,  leaving  off  in  the  middle  of  a  phrase. 
Then  rose  from  the  bass  the  song  of  the  Angelus,  or  rather,  it 
seemed  like  the  vague  emotion  of  one  who,  as  he  passes,  hears 
in  the  ruins  of  some  wayside  cloister  the  ghosts  of  old  monks 
humming  their  drowsy  melodies,  as  the  sun  goes  down  rapidly, 
and  the  purple  shadows  of  Italy  steal  over  the  land,  out  of  the 
orange  west ! 

We  sat  motionless — the  disciple  on  one  side,  I  on  th3 
other.  Liszt  was  almost  as  motionless :  his  fingers  seemed  quite 
independent,  chance  ministers  of  his  soul.  The  dream  was 
broken  by  a  pause ;  then  came  back  the  little  swaying  passage 
of  bells,  tossing  high  up  in  the  evening  air,  the  half-bar  of 
silence,  the  broken  rhythm — and  the  Angelus  was  rung. 

Luncheon  being  announced,  we  rose,  and  Liszt,  turning  to  his 
young  friend  Polig,  who  occupies  an  apartment  at  Este,  and 
enjoys  the  great  master's  help  in  his  musical  studies :  "  Go,  dear 
friend,"  he  said,  **  and  join  us  in  about  an  hour — nay,  sooner  if 
you  will." 

So  we  sat  down  in  the  cosily  furnished  little  sitting-room — 
dark,  like  all  the  Abbate's  suite  of  apartments,  and  evidently 
intended  to  shut  out  the  sun. 

I  was  still  heated  with  ourvclambering  walk,  and  Liszt  insisted 
on  my  keeping  on  my  great-coat,  and  provided  me  in  addition 
with  a  priest's  silken  skull-cap,  playfully  remarking.  "  As  you 
call  me  '  Abbate,'  I  shall  address  you  as  '  II  Reverendo,*  and 
whenever  you  come  here,  you  will  find  this  priest's  cap  ready 
for  you." 

The  "  hospitalite  de  garcon ''  proved  anything  but  ascetic.  A 
vegetable  soup,  maccaroni  with  tomato  sauce,  a  faultless  beef- 
steak or  "  bistecco"  dressed  with  fried  mushrooms,  cooked  dry ; 


A  DAY   WITH  LISZT  IN  1880.  II3 

a  peculiar  salad,  composed  of  a  variety  of  herbs  in  addition  to 
leeks,  onions,  lettuce,  and  fruit,  the  like  of  which  I  can  never 
hope  to  take  until  I  lunch  again  with  the  Abbate  at  the  Villa 
d'Este. 

We  were  alone.  I  need  not  say  that,  in  such  company,  the 
wines  seemed  to  me  to  possess  an  ideal  fragrance  and  a  Sicilian 
flavor  wholly  unlike  and  incomparably  superior  to  the  heavy 
vintages  of  Spain.  There  were  some  questions  about  Mendels- 
sohn and  Chopin  that  I  had  always  wished  to  ask  ;  but  at  first 
the  conversation  was  much  more  general.  We  spoke  of  the 
curious  recent  fancy  of  the  Italians  for  Wagner's  music ;  the  way 
his  operas  had  been  produced  at  Bologna,  and  just  then  "  Rienzi " 
at  Rome.  '*  Yes,"  he  said  ;  '*  the  Italians  are  beginning  to  un- 
de/stand  more  kinds  of  melody  than  one ;  they  perceive,  per- 
haps,  that  Wagner's  melody  pervades  each  part  of  his  score,  so 
that  you  can  have  a  melodic  a  plusieurs  etages.  This  notion  of 
"a  melody  in  fiats,"  or  "of  several  stories,"  struck  me  as  most 
apt,  as  well  as  humorous.  Speaking  of  Wagner,  I  related  to 
him  an  unhappy  occasion  on  which  I  had  been  requested  by 

Lord to  try  and  prevail  on  Wagner,  when  in  England,  to 

accompany  me  to  his  house  one  night,  where  we  were  to  meet  a 
royal  princess  most  anxious  to  see  Wagner.  I  reluctantly  under- 
took the  mission,  but  failed  to  induce  the  great  Maestro  to  go 
with  me,  and  was  placed  in  the  unpleasant  position  of  having 
to  apologize  on  my  arrival  for  his  absence.  "  Ah,"  said  Liszt, 
laughing,  "  a  similar  thing  occurred  to  me  lately :  some  royal- 
ties at  Sienna  asked  me  to  get  Wagner  to  meet  them  ;  but  I 
-knew  Wagner  better,  and  at  once  declined  to  charge  myself 

with  that  commission.    Your  mention  of  Lord reminds  me 

that  1  knew  him.years  ago;  indeed,  in  my  young  days,  I  was  on 
one  occasion  at  his  house,  and,  curiously  enough,  a  regrettable 
event  occurred  to  me  also.  Some  ladies  present  importuned  me 
to  play,  i  was  not  unwilling,  but  I  did  not  quite  care  for  the 
manner  in  which  I  was  pressed,  and  I  declined ;  indeed,  I  be- 
lieve I  left  the  house  rather  abruptly.    Well,  it  was  a  time  when 


114  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZII^E. 

I  was  pkying  a  good  deal' in  the  various  capitals  of  Europe,  and 
much  more  fuss,  was  being  made  with  me  than  was  perhaps 
necessary;  and  then,  you  know,  I  was  much  younger,  and  I 
dare  say  acted  hastily  ;  but  I  have  always  regretted  it." 

He  spoke  very  little  of  his  extraordinary  successes  when  at 
/lis  zenith,  which  can  only  be  compared  to  the  sensation  pro- 
duced by  Paganini.  But  he  spoke  with  pride  of  having  received 
the  celebrated  kiss  of  Beethoven.  **  Ay,"  he  said,  "  when  I  was. 
a  very  young  man,  and  in  public,  too,  it  was  difficult  to  get  the 
great  man  to  go  and  hear  rising  talent ;  but  my  father  got 
Schindler  to  induce  Beethoven  to  come  and  hear  me — and  he 
embraced  me  before  the  whole  company."  A  similar  event 
occurred  to  Joachim,  who,  when  a  boy,  received  the  public  em- 
brace of  Mendelssohn  after  playfng  a  fugue  of  Bach's. 

Liszt  spoke  in  the  highest  terms  of  Herr  Richter,  at  the  same 
time  regretting  that  the  Wagner  Festivals  at  the  Albert  Hall 
had  not  been  financially  more  successful. 

Having  been  accused,  in  America  and  elsewhere,  of  misrepre- 
senting the  relations  between  Wagner  and  Meyerbeer,  and 
knowing  that  Wagner  will  never  mention  Meyerbeer's  name; 
nor  allow  any  one  to  speak  of  him  in  his  presence,  I  asked  Liszt 
whether  it  was  true  that  Meyerbeer  had  introduced  Wagner  to 
M.  Joly  in  Paris,  with  a  view  to  bringing  but  his  "Flying 
Dutchman,"  knowing  all  the  time  that  M.  Joly  was  on  the  point 
of  bankruptcy.  *'  Well,"  said  Liszt,  "  that  is  probably  true.  No 
one  is  exactly  to  blame,  if  a  young  unknown  man  fails  to  arrive 
at  once  at  the  Grand  Opera  de  Paris ;  getting  up  a  work  there 
is  a  question  of  many  months  and  thousands  of  pounds.  Wag- 
ner's litwetto  was  bought  for  a  small  sum,  his  music  discarded, 
and  he  was  practically  turned  adrift.  Afterward,  he  was 
notoriously  forced  to  live  by  arranging  Italian  opera  tunes  for 
the  piano  and  cornet-a-piston.  It  is  possible  that  Meyerbeer 
may  have  been  of  some  small  use  to  Wagner  at  first,  but  Wag- 
ner will  not  hear  of  him.  Mendelssohn  had  the  same  antipathy." 
Now  I  saw  another  opportunity :  "  I  have  often  wondercdr  in 


A  DAY   WITH  LISZT  IN  i88a  1 15 

reading  Mendelssohn's  letters,"  I  said,  **  why  his  allusions  to  you 
are  so  brief  and  so  few ;  here  and  there,  we  read  that  you  were 
of  the  company,  that  the  evening  was  delightful,  and  that  you 
or  Chopin  played  ;  and  Mendelssohn  seems  to  have  little  more 
to  say,  though  in  his  allusions  to  many  of  his  great  contempora- 
ries he  is  often  explicit  and  detailed  enough."  "  Ah !  well," 
said  Liszt,  '*  Mendelssohn's  letters  have  been,  to  some  extent, 
what  is  called  arranged  and  selected  for  publication.  There  is 
a  good  deal  which  it  was  not  advisable  to  print,  or  that  couldn't 
be  printed ;  and  then  there  was  something  between  me  and 
Mendelssohn :  I  am  sure  I  don't  quite  know  what;  but  at  one 
time,  a  certain  coolness  sprang  up  between  us ;  it  was,  however, 
much  more  between  our  followers  than  between  us.  Mendels- 
sohn did  not  get  on  with  the  French  :  at  Paris,  for  instance,  and 
with  reason  there ;  then,  at  Berlin  and  Leipsic  too  he  had  his 
difficulties  with  the  musical  authorities,  some  of  whom  were 
certainly  my  friends.  The  first  time  I  saw  Mendelssohn  was  at 
Berlin  ;  I  called  in  the  morning,  about  twelve  o'clock ;  he  was 
charming,  full  of  life  and  vigor,  and  received  me  joyously. 
Madame  Mendelssphn  pressed  me  to  stay  to  lunch,  and,  mean- 
ing to  go,  I  still  stayed  on  talking  and  playing,  till  suddenly  it 
was  six  o'clock,  and  then  he  said,  *  Now  you  must  stay  and  dine.' 
So  I  stayed,  and  left  about  nine  o'clock,  after  a  delightful  day ; 
then  the  next  time  we  met,  we  had  some  words  about  Meyer- 
beer, whom  Mendelssohn  could  not  endure,  and  I  spoke  rather 
hotly.  I  dare  say  I  was  in  the  wrong,  but  somehow,  from  that 
time,  we  ceased  to  be  quite  so  cordial,  and  we  did  not  meet  very 
often  ;  but  there  was  no  rupture  or  quarrel  between  us,  none 
ever ;  our  partisans  quarreled  ;  but  between  us  personally  there 
was  never  any  real  animosity.  And  then  quite  late  in  his  career, 
a  year  before  he  died,  Mendelssohn  did  a  very  graceful  little 
thing.  He  bought  me  a  MS.  of  Beethoven,  a  chorus  copied  in 
Beethoven's  hand  out  of  Mozart's  *  Don  Juan ;'  he  knew  it  was 
the  kind  of  thing  I  should  value  very  highly,  and  he  bade  me 
keep  it  for  his  sake.    Well,  I  was  traveling  about — I  gave  it 


Il6  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

with  other  things  into  my  mother's  keeping,  and  I  suppose  it 
was  showri  about,  and  some  one  stole  it ;  at  any  rate,  it  disap- 
peared; but  I  always  like  to  reniember  it,  because  it  proved 
that,  notwithstanding  the  serious  differences  which  had  arisen 
between  our  schools  and  methods  before  his  death,  personally 
he  felt  kindly  toward  me  down  to  the  last." 

The  conversation  turning  on  Heine — "  Of  course  I  knew 
Heine.  He  was  one  of  those  original  eccentrics  whom  it  is  dif- 
ficult to  class :  his  reputation  was  a  celebrite  d'auberge.  Yes.  he 
alluded  to  me  in  some  of  his  prose  works  not  unkindly.  I  had 
the  misfortune  (maladresse)  to  set  one  of  his  songs  to  music." 

"  How  few  good  poems  there  are  suitable  for  music  I" 

"  Yes,  and  how  little  good  music !" 

Of  Paganini  he  said,  "  No  one  who  has  not  heard  him  can 
form  the  least  idea  of  his  playing.  The  fourth-string  perform- 
ances, the  tunes  in  harmonics,  and  the  arpeggios  used  as  he  used 
them,  were  then  all  new  to  the  public  and  the  players  too ;  they 
sat  staring  at  him  open-mouthed.  Every  one  can  play  his  music 
now,  but  the  same  impression  can  never  again  be  made." 

Of  Bottesini,  the  double  bass  soloist,  he  said,  "  He  is  the  only- 
great  player  of  my  time  whom  I  have  never  heard." 

Liszt  was  very  humorous  upon  vamped-up  reputations,  and 
the  airs  and  graces  which  musicians  give  themselves. 

"After  a  bit,  in  England,  at  least,  you  must  be  'dignified* — 
that  is  a  good  word;  the  English  like  a  'dignified  professor!*  " 
and  he  drew  himself  up  like  a  very  Pecksniff,  put  on  a  look  of 
solemn  and  dictatorial  gravity,  lifting  both  hands  sideways  as  it 
were  to  keep  off  all  common  intruders. 

Speaking  of  Billow  and  of  Rubinstein,  he  said,  "  They  are 
two  men  who  stand  quite  apart  from  all  the  rest ;  still,  the  gen- 
eral level  of  pianoforte-playing  has  immensely  risen  within  the 
last  twenty  years.  There  is,  however,  a  good  deal  of  *  humbug  * 
about  some  professional  reputations  ;**  and  pretending  to  hold 
very  carefully  a  watering-pot.  he  added,  "  Somereputations  take 
a  good  deal  of  judicious  watering.    I  could  mention  some  whp 


.^ 


&=^»-^ 


../    DAY    WITH  LISZT  LV  iSSo.  11/ 

had  the  good  fortune  to  marry  people  who  watered  them  beau- 
tifully  in  the  newspapers.  It  makes  some  difference,  you  know. 
I  don't  say  that  you  can  create  a  reputation  without  talent ; 
but  the  *  humbug  *  is  too  often  at  top,  and  the  '  talent '  at  the 
bottom;  and  in  England  you  are  miserably  taken  in  by  foreign- 
ers, h  is  your  own  fault ;  but  the  way  mediocre  foreign  talent 
has  been  over  and  over  again  pushed  in  England — especially 
bad  singers^s  simply  scandalous." 

How  interesting  it  would  be  to  read  the  memoirs  and  criti- 
cisms of  Liszt  upon  music  and  musicians  for  the  last  fifty  years  \ 
No  one  living,  perhaps,  with  the  exception  of  Professor  Ella,  has 
such  a  rich  store  of  musical  experience  and  incident  to  fall  back 
upon. 

"  I  have  often  wished,"  I  said,  "  that  you  had  written  more  of 
your  recollections  of  those  great  musicians,  artists,  and  poets 
with  whom  you  have  been  connected."  I  alluded  to  his  charm- 
ing Life  of  Chopin.  "  Ah !"  he  said  abruptly,  "  Chopin  had  no 
life,  properly  speaking;  his  was  an  exclusive,  self-centered  per- 
sonality. He  lived  inwardly — he  was  silent  and  reserved,  never 
said  much,  and  people  were  often  deceived  about  him,  and  he 
never  undeceived  them.  People  talk  of  the 'j/y/^*  of  Chopin, 
the  *  touch  *  of  Chopin,  and  of  playing  like  Chopin,  When  he 
played  himself,  he  played  admirably  well,  and  especially  his  own 
compositions ;  but  he  was  supposed  to  have  formed  a  school  of 
Chopin ites,  who  had  the  Tradition — and  you  heard  that  Mr. 
This,  and  Madame  That — they  alone  could  play  like  Chopin — 
he  had  formed  them — people  danced  round  them,  and  they 
affected  to  have  the  true  Chopin  secret.  Yes,"  he  said,  *•  it  was 
absurd  enough;  and  Chopin  looked  on,  and  said  nothing;  he 
was  very  diplomatic— he  never  troubled  himself  to  stop  this  cant, 
and  to  this  day  there  may  be  those  who  play  *  like  Chopin  ' — 
who  have  received  the  sacred  'Tradition.'  C'6tait  comme  cela 
du  commencement,  ce  n'6tait  pas  I'ecole,  c'6tait  plut6t  'r6glise 
de  Chopin  I' "  The  last  words  were  pronounced  in  a  solemn 
tone,  and  with  a  look  of  mock  gravity  indescribably  humorous. 


) 


Il8  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

As  he  rose  from  the  table,  Liszt  said,  "  You  spoke  of  my  sketch 
of  Chopin — I  have  juSt  brought  out  a  new  edition  of  it  at  Leip- 
sic."  We  went  into  the  library,  and  he  gave  me  a  handsome 
quarto  volume  of  312  pages,  printed  in  French  on  fine  paper; 
**  Take  it,"  he  said ;  "  you  will  find  some  forty  pages  more  than  in 
the  edition  you  have  read."  J  opened  the  volume,  and  on  the 
frontispiece  found  that  Liszt  had  written  aslant^ — 

"  Au  rev6rend  Hugh  Reginald  Haweis,  affectueux  souvenir 
de  la  Villa  d'Este. 

"November  17, 

"'80. 

"F.  Liszt." 

I  had  conceived,  ever  since  I  had  studied  the  life  and  work* 
of  Chopin,  the  greatest  desire  to  hear  him  played  by  Liszt: 
indeed,  the  number  of  those  still  living  who  have  had  this  privi- 
lege must  be  very  limited.  I  ventured  to  say,  *•  Chopin  always 
maintained  that  you  were  the  most  perfect  exponent  of  his 
works.  I  cannot  say  how  grateful  I  should  be  to  hear,  were  it 
only  a  fugitive  passage  of  Chopin's,  touched  by  your  hand." 
"  With  all  the  pleasure  in  the  world,"  replied  the  immortal 
pianist;  and  again  I  sat  down  by  the  grand  piano,  and  humming 
to  him  a  phrase  of  op.  37,  I  begged  that  it  miglit  be  like  that. 
"  I  will  play  that,  and  another  after  it."  (The  second  was  op.  48.) 

It  is  useless  for  me  to  attempt  a  description  of  a  performance 
every  phrase  of  which  will  be  implanted  in  my  memory,  and  on 
my  heart,  as  long  as  I  live. 

Again,  in  that  room,  with  its  long  bright  window  opening  out 
into  the  summer-land,  we  sat  in  deep  shadow — in  perfect  seclu- 
sion ;  not  a  sound,  but  the  magic  notes  falling  at  first  like  a  soft 
shower  of  pearls  or  liquid  drops  from  a  fountain — blown  spray 
falling  hither  and  thither,  and  changing  into  rainbow  tints  in  its 
passage,  as  the  harmonic  progression  kept  changing,  and  tossing 
the  fugitive  fragments  of  melody  with  which  that  exquisite  noc- 
urne  opens,  until  it  settles  into  the  calm,  happy  dream,  which 


A   DAY    WITH  LISZT  IN  1880.  1 19 

seems  to  rock  the  listener  to  sleep  with  the  deep  and  perfect 
benison  of  ineffable  rest ;    then  out  of  the  dream,  through  a 
few  bars,  like  the  uneasy  consciousness  of  a  slowly  awakening 
sleeper,  and  again  the  interlude,  the  blown  rain  of  double  pearls 
— until  once  more  the  heavenly  dream  is  resumed.    I  drew  my 
chair  gently  nearer,  I  almost  held  my  breath,  not  to  miss  a  note. 
There  was  a  strange  concentrated  anticipation  about  Liszt's 
playing,  unlike  anjrthing  I  had  ever  heard — not  for  a  moment 
could  the  ear  cease  listening ;  each  note  seemed  prophetic  of 
the  next,  each  yielded  in  importance  to  the  next :  one  felt  that 
in  the  soul  of  the  player  the  whole  nocturne  existed  from  the 
b^inning — as  one  and  indivisible,  like  a  poem  in  the  heart  of  a 
poet.     The  playing  of  the  bars  had  to  be  gone  through  seriatim  ; 
but  there  were  glimpses  of  a  higher  state  of  intuition,  in  which 
one  could  read  thoughts  without  words,  and  possess  the  soul  of 
music,  without  the  intervention  of  bars  and  keys  and  strings ; 
all  the  mere  elements  seemed  to  fade,  nothing  but  perception 
remained.  Sense  of  the  time  vanished ;  all  was  as  it  were  realized 
in  a  moment,  that  moment  the  Present — the  eternal  Present- 
no  Past,  no  Future.    Yet  I  could  not  help  noticing  each  inci- 
dent: the  perfect  effortless  independence  of  the  fingers,  mere 
obedient  ministers  of  the  master's  thought ;  the  complete  trance 
of  the  player— -living  in  the  ideal  world,  and  reducing  the  world 
of  matter  about  him  to  the  flimsiest  of  unreal  shadows ;  and  I 
had  time  to  notice  the  unconscious  habits  of  the  master,  which 
have  alread}*^  passed  into  historic  mannerisms  in  his  disciples, 
like  Cardinal  Newman's  stooping  gait,  or  Victor's  Emmanuel's 
toss  of  the  head.    So  I  noted  the  first  finger  and  thumb  drawn 
together  to  emphasize  a  note,  or  the  fingers  doubled  up.  or 
lifted  in  a  peculiar  manner,  with  a  gentle  sweep  in  the  middle 
of  a  phrase — things  in  which  those  are  determined  to  be  like  the 
master  who  can  be  like  him  in  nothing  else ;  also  the  peculiar 
repercussion  resonance,  since  reduced  to  something  like  a  science 
by  Rubinstein,  and  the  caressing  touch,  which  seems  to  draw 
the  soul  of  the  piano  out  of  it  almost  before  the  finger  reaches 


120  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

the  key-board.  When  Liszt  passed  silently  to  op.  48,  he  arrived 
at  some  stiff  bravura  passages,  which  called  forth  his  old  vigor. 
Yet  here  all  was  perfect ;  not  a  note  slurred  over  or  missed  ;  the  . 
old  thunder  woke  beneath  his  outstretched  hands;  the  spirits  of 
the  vasty  deep  were  as  obedient  as  ever  to  their  master's  call. 
With  the  last  chord,  he  rose  abruptly ;  abruptly  we  came  out  of 
the  dim  enchanted  land  of  dreams ;  the  common  light  of  day 
was  once  more  around  me.  "  Now  you  must  be  off !"  he 
exclaimed;  indeed,  I  had  barely  time  to  catch  my  tram  for 
Rome ;  "  but,"  he  added,  "  I  have  something  I  wish  you  to  take 
to  Bache  and  Dannreuther ;"  and  he  took  out  three  bronze 
medals,  giving  me  the  third  to  keep;  the  design  was  by  a 
Roman  artist  of  great  merit.  On  one  side  was  Liszt's  own 
profile,  on  the  other  a  star-crowned  Fame  holding  a  palm- 
branch. 

Before  I  left.  I  asked  Liszt  if  I  might  give  some  account  in 
print  of  the  delightful  day  I  had  spent  in  his  company,  so  that 
the  hearts  of  his  many  friends  and  admirers  in  England  might 
be  gladdened  by  some  account  of  him. 

"  Whatever  you  will,"  he  good-naturedly  replied ;  "write  what 
you  like,  and  let  me  see  it  when  it  appears." 

Liszt  changes  his  residence  three  times  every  year:  from 
Rome  to  Weimar,  from  Weimar  to  Pesth,  and  at  Pesth  he  is 
usually  occupied  in  bringing  out  or  conducting  some  of  hris 
works.  Although  probably  nothing  will  ever  induce  the  ma- 
gician of  the  pinaforte  to  play  in  public  again,  notwithstanding 
his  marvelous  retention  of  execution  and  nervous  energy,  it  Js 
to  be  hoped  that  he  may  still  be  induced  to  visit  England, 
where  his  name  has  already  become  a  tradition  like  that  of 
Malibran  (to  whom  he  always  said  he  owed  so  much),  or  Pa- 
ganini,  with  whom  he  has  been  popularly  classed.  And  now 
that  his  orchestral  works  are  getting  hold  of  the  musical  world 
here,  and  that  every  season  pianoforte  recitals  rest  for  their  main 
sensations  on  his  unique  compositions,  we  cannot  doubt  what 
sort  of  reception  he  would  meet  with  in  London,  could  he  be 


THE  STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.  121 

persuaded  to  come  over  and  condudt,  or  even  superintend,  one 
of  his  orchestral  preludes.  But  Liszt  hates  the  sea;  indeed,  I 
am  told  that  he  objects  even  to  going  over  the  suspension 
bridge  at  Florence.  I  ventured  to  say  to  him,  "  In  England  we 
have  heard  of  Liszt,  but  already  he  js  a  kind  of  mythus.  '  His 
legend,'^as  M.  Renan  would  say,  *has  begun  to  form.'  People 
are  beginning  to  ask,  Was  there  indeed  ever  such  a  person  ? 
Come  over  and  prove  to  us  that  he  still  exists."  But  he  only 
shook  his  head.  "  I  am  too  old ;  I  cannot  come  to  England." 
Will  he  come  ? 

Rev.  H.  R.  Haweis,  in  Belgravia. 


THE  STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.* 

If  "silence,"  as  the  Count  Claudio  affirms,  be  "the  perfectest 
herald  of  joy,"  my  words  this  evening  should  be  very  few ;  and  I 
might  be  content  to  say,  as  Clown  in  "  As  You  Like  It,"  "Salu- 
tation and  greeting  to  you  all!"  For  surely  there  could  be,  to 
me,  no  greater  joy,  as  I  know  of  no  higher  honor,  than  that  of 
being  selected  by  a  body  of  Shakespeare  students  to  address  a 
meeting  composed  of  so  many  lovers  of  his  works,  on  this  the 
anniversary  of  his  birth.  At  the  same  time  I  have  a  deep  sense 
of  the  difficulty  and  responsibility  of  the  position  I  am  so  proud 
to  occupy;  for  I  fully  realize  how  impossible  it  is  for  me  to 
throw  any  new  light  upon  a  subject  which  has  for  over  three 
centuries  been  a  favorite  theme  for  the  exercise  of  the  highest 
intellects.  The  literary  men  of  America  and  England,  as  well  as 
of  Germany,  France,  and  Spain,  have  found  their  most  conge- 
nial tasks  in  studying  the  philosophy,  sympathizing  with  the 
human  nature,  or  admiring  the  glorious  poetry  of  the  Stratford 
wool-comber's  son.  "It  is  the  cause;  it  is  the  cause,"  as  poor 
Othello  says,  for  which  I  ask  your  attention  and  forbearance. 

♦  Read  before  the  Shakespeare  Club  of  Wheeling,  W.  Va..  April  23,  x88t. 


122  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

"Hear  me  for  my  cause/' says  the  noble  Brutus;  "be  patient 
till  the  last ;  censure  me  in  your  wisdom,  and  awake  your  senses 
that  you  may  the  better  judge."  All  hail,  then,  ye  members  of 
the  Shakespeare  Club  of  Wheeling !  All  hail,  fellow-students  of 
the  heaven-gifted  bard ;  the  anniversary  of  whose  birth,  in  obe- 
dience to  one  of  the  purest  inspirations  of  the  heart — simple 
gratitude — we  are  assembled  on  this  joyous  occasion  to  celebrate. 

Since  I  had  the  happiness  of  meeting  with  you  last,  we  have 
passed  through  a  year  of  extraordinary  activity.  Business^  the 
learned  professions,  speculation,  invention,  politics,  have  all 
been  on  the  qui  vive.  Our  own  delightful  specialty  has  felt  the 
impulse;  and  perhaps  at  no  time  since  the  1597  quarto  of  "Ro- 
meo and  Juliet"  saw  the  light  in  the  little  shop  of  its  surrepti- 
tious publishers,  down  to  the  present  da5%  has  the  study  of 
Shakespeare  Ueen  so  wide-spread,  or  the  desire  to  understand 
and  enjoy  his  delightful  works  been  so  universally  cultivated. 
A  few  years  ago  Shakespeare  was  a  sealed  book  to  the  young; 
now  there  is  hardly  an  institution  of  learning  in  the  land  where 
he  is  not  studied  as  a  classic.  A  few  years  ago,  through  a  big- 
oted misapprehension  of  the  grandeur,  and  beauty,  and  wisdom 
of  these  immortal  works,  most  of  the  clergy  and  members  of 
churches  (good,  God-fearing  people,  but  erring  through  igno- 
rance) lost  all  the  pleasure  and  profit  of  their  teachings,  because, 
forsooth,  they  were  labelled  "plays."  Now,  this  barrier  is  fast 
breaking  down,  and  ministers  of  the  Gospel  are  finding  the 
grandest  illustrations  of  their  doctrines  and  precepts  in  the  pages 
of  Shakespeare.  As  a  witness  of  this  activity,  there  are  to-day 
no  less  than  three  new,  exhaustively  annotated  editions  of  the 
poet  in  course  of  publication  in  this  country  alone;  while  of 
ordinary  reprints  and  editions  for  general  use  the  number  is 
legion. 

It  is  not,  however,  to  the  mass  of  readers,  to  the  mere  shallow 
investigator,  or  to  the  man  who  takes  up  Shakespeare  in  order  to 
dawdle  away  a  passing  hour,  that  the  poet  opens  out  his  great  and 
loving  heart.    As  most  of  you  well  know,  the  inspiration  must  be 


THE  STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE,  1 23 

soaght  by  long,  close,  and  persevering  labor.  The  poet  must  be 
courted  with  ail  the  ardor  and  determination  of  a  lover,  if  we 
wish  to  be  successful.  To  many,  at  first,  he  seems  hard  and  per- 
verse. They  meet,  perhaps  on  the  very  threshold,  an  antiquated 
or  involved  expression — then  another,  and  another — elliptical 
constructions,  obscurities  of  style,  and  obsolete  allusions  of  all 
kinds ;  and  they  are  chilled  and  disappointed.  But  let  such  men 
reflect  that  these  works  were  written  to  be  understood,  and  that 
by  audiences  of  less  average  intelligence  than  those  who  attend 
the  theaters  of  to-day ;  that  the  great  master  of  the  human  heart 
and  tongue  could  not  write  meaningless  nonsense;  let  them  read 
on  and  on — text  and  context — again  and  again,  using  such  helps 
and  commentaries  as  they  possess,  and  they  are  sure  to  be  re-  . 
warded  in  finding  light  breaking  through  the  darkest  clouds : 
just  as  when  one  is  beho.lding  a  piece  of  statuary  in  the  stereo- 
scope, thd  picture  at  first  seems  flat,  and  blurred,  and.  double; 
but  let  the  eye  be  steadily  directed  upon  it,  and  soon,  as  by  a 
flash,  it  stands  out  in  all  the  light  and  shade,  the  prominence 
and  beauty,  of  the  original  group.  Once  imbued  with  the  poet's 
spirits,  once  illuminated  under  his  influence  and  inspiration,  and 
who  can  tell  the  joy,  the  comfort,  the  intellectual  satisfaction 
that  awaits  you  !  The  page  is  then  "  as  plain  as  way  to  parish 
church,"  and  the  study  becomes  no  longer  a  task,  but  an  ever- 
increasing  fascination.  A  few  impracticable  "ullorxals,"  am- 
phibious "scamels,"  or  irredeemable  "  rope-scarres"  may  remain 
for  ingenuity  to  practice  upon ;  but  even  these  are  constantly 
diminishing  under  the  powerful  focus  of  "dialect"  and  "  folk- 
lore" societies,  and  the  comprehensive  study  that  is  directed  to 
the  elucidation  of  these  works,  more  than,  with  the  exception  of 
the  Bible,  has  ever  been  exercised  upon  any  other  book  in  the 
world.  In  the  year  just  passed,  not  one  of  us  here  to-night  but 
has  felt,  more  or  less,  the  vicissitudes  of  life — its  sufferings  and 
disappointments,  as  well  as  its  hopes  and  enjoyments;  but  I 
believe  I  speak  for  you  all  when  I  say  we  have  never  found 
Shakespeare  to  fail  us.    In  sickness  and  io  health,  in  adversity 


124  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

as  well  as  in  prosperity,  our  beloved  poet  has  been  to  us  a  solace 
and  a  delight.  Of  this  ennobling  pursuit  it  may  well  be  said 
that,  like  Antony's  bounty  : 

There  is  no  winter  in  't. 
An  autumn  *tis  that  grows  the  more  by  reaping. 

Shakespeare  has  been,  and  is,  our  comfort  mom  and  night; 
At  home,  abroad,  through  good  or  ill  report. 
The  same  firm  friend,  the  same  refreshment  rich. 
And  source  of  consolation. 

Age  cannot  wither  kim^  nor  custom  stale 
His  infinite  variety:  other /<»r^  cloy 
The  appetite  they  feed  ;  but  he  makes  hungry 
Where  most  he  satisfies. 

As  I  before  remarked,  it  is  in  simple  gratitude  for  the  rich 
heritage  this  poet  has  left  us  that  we  are  here  to  celebrate  his 
birthday;  to  strike  the  hand  of  fraternal  greeting, and  "  cheer 
each  other  in  each  other's  love." 

Let  every  man,  therefore,  put  himself  into  triumph,  each  man  to  what  sport  and 
revels  his  addiction  leads  him ;  for  it  is  our  General *s  birthday.  So  much  was  his 
pleasure  should  be  proclaimed.  All  offices  are  open,  and  there  is  full  liberty  of 
feasting,  from  this  present  hour  till  the  bell  hath  told  elevgn." 

Shakespeare  himself  believed  in  birthdays,  and  believed  in 
keeping  them;  not  that  he  makes  a  point  of  telling  us  so;  but 
we  gather  it  from  several  of  those  bits  of  realism  that  give  such 
a  natural  effect  to  the  speeches  of  his  characters.    Witness 

Cleopatra : 

It  is  my  birthday : 
I  had  thought  to  have  held  it  poor ;  but,  since  my  lord 
Is  Antony  again,  I  will  be  Cleopatra. 

And  Cassius  to  his  friend  Messala : 

This  is  my  birthday ;  as  this  very  day 

Was  Cassius  born.    Give  me  thy  hand,  Messala. 

It  detracts  nothing  from  the  pleasure  and  genuineness  of  our 
celebration  that  we  are  uncertain  of  the  exact  day  of  the  great 


THE   STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.  1 2$ 

poet's  birth.    We  keep  the  23d  of  April  as  Shakespeare's  birth- 
day, just  as  we  keep  the  25th  of  December  as  our  Saviour's  birth- 
day, because  long  tradition  has  so  decided  it.     Indeed,  if  we 
reflect  a  moment,  we  are  all  but  certain  that  the  23d  of  April 
cannot  now  be  the  correct  date.     What  we  know  by  record  of 
the  register  is  that  the  child  William  Shakespeare  was  baptized 
on  the  26th  of  April,  1564;  and  we  know  that  it  was  a  common 
custom  to  baptize  infants  on  the  third  day  after  their  birth ;  but 
then  it  was  not  unexceptionably  so;  for  Oliver  Cromwell  was 
baptized  on  the  fourth  day,  the  earl  of  Clarendon  on  the  fourth 
day,  and  John  Milton  not  until  the  eleventh  day  after  birth. 
Again,  we  know  by  record  on  his  tomb  that  our  poet  died  on  the 
23d  of  April,  1616,  in  his  53d  year,  and  the  tradition  is  unani- 
mous that  he  died  on  his  birthday.     But  this  point  has  always 
been  overlooked,  that  dates  were  then  reckoned  in  what  is  called 
old  style ;,  that  in  Shakespeare's  day  the  new  style  (which  was  not 
then  observed  in  England)  was  ten  days  in  advance  of  the  old  ; 
and  that  there  is  now  a  difference  of  twelve  days  between  them ; 
so  that  the  23d  of  April,  O.  S.,  was,  in  1564,  the  3d  of  May,  N.  S., 
a  date  which  a':  the  present  time  corresponds  to  the  5th  of  May, 
N.  S. ;  and  it  has  accordingly  been  made  a  question  whether  we 
should  not  celebrate  the  occasion  on  either  the  3d  or  5th  of  May 
.  in  every  year.     I  mention  this,  not  that  it  is  of  much  impor- 
tance, but  it  is  well  enough  to  bear  it  in  mind,  as  it  has  been  so 
often  asserted  that  Shakespeare  and  Cervantes  died  on  the  same 
day,  the  fact  being  that  Shakespeare  survived  Cervantes  ten 
days. 

At  your  banquet,  a  year  ago,  I  endeavored  to  give  a  hasty 
outline  of  our  great  poet's  inner  life,  as  developed  through  his 
works  ;  and  when  I  received  your  kind  invitation  to  address  you 
again,  I  thought  it  might  be  interesting  to  follow  this  up  by  a 
rapid  analysis  of  these  works  themselves  (I  mean  the  dramas), 
from,  say,  "  Love's  Labor's  Lost"  down  to  "  The  Tempest"  and 
"Henry  VII L;"  and  trace  not  only  the  changes  in  the  poet's 
style  and  versification,  but  \\iit growth  of  his  magnificent  mental 


126  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

power,  after  he  had  shaken  of!  the  trammels  of  his  surrounain^ 
in  the  dramatic  art,  and  felt  the  grandeur  and  nobility  of  his  own 
independent  intellect.  But  I  found  the  subject  far  too  vast  for 
ftn  occasion  like  the  present.  Thoroughly  to  analyze  one  play; 
proj)erly  to  follow  the  development  and  harmony  of  many  a 
single  character — would  fill  a  moderate  volume.  Even  the  bare 
bibliography  of  these  works,  from  the  folio  down  to  the  editions 
of  Dyce,  and  Hudson,  and  Furness,  with  the  changes  the  text 
has  undergone  since  1623,  would  furnish  matter  for  a  whole 
course  of  lectures.  '  •  . 

It  has  been  remarked  as  one  of  the  highest  characteristics  of 
Shakespeare's  powers,  that  whatever  play  of  his  we  read  last 
appears  to  us  the  best  and  loveliest  of  all.  And  to  me,  at  least, 
this  is  true.  While  I  read  "  Othello,"  there  is  no  work  of  human 
genius  that  can  hold  a  place  beside  it.  It  is  altogether  alone — 
a  work  by  itself,  a  sj)ecies  of  itself.  Sui  generis  is  the  Machia- 
velian  villainy  of  lago ;  the  subtle  knowledge  of  human  nature 
displayed  in  the  conception  and  realization  of  this  character,  the 
noble  and  faithful  mold  of  the  unhappy  Moor,  the  gentle  purity 
of  Desdemona,  and  the  unredeemed  nature  of  the  tragedy  in 
which  these  three  play  their  parts,  appear  to  me  so  intense,  so 
powerful,  so  apart  in  their  nature  and  their  issues  from  any  means 
which  have,  before  or  since,  been  adopted  by  the  great  masters  of  • 
the  dramatic  art,  that  for  the  time  whatever  feeling  I  am  capable 
of,  whether  it  be  love  or  hate,  or  scorn  or  pity,  or  admiration  or 
grief,  is  absorbed  and  lost  in  th*  consideration  of  this  masterpiece. 
Your  small  dramatist  would  never  have  dared  to  do  as  the  great 
master  has  done.  Even  a  man  of  average  genius  would  have 
feared  to  bring  this  drama  to  an  issue  so  unspeakably  pathetic, 
by  means  so  revolting;  ^^ would  have  unmasked  lago, and  have 
reconciled  Othello  and  Desdemona,  and  we  should  have  had  the 
curtain  descending  on  a  scene  of  gratulation  and  rejoicing.  But 
Shakespeare  could  dare  both  the  highest  heaven  and  the  deepn 
est  hell  of  which  humanity  is  capable ;  and  there  was  no  weak- 
ness in  his  greatly-complete,  artistic  soul.    There  never  was 


THE   STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.  12/ 

anything  like  this  for  utter  sadness.  I^  is  the  most  pathetic  of 
stories;  unmitigated  tragedy,  misery,  and  remorse,  unbearable 
and  unspeakable.  Sorrow  seems  to  culminate,  to  have  reached 
its  full ;  but  there  is  yet  a  bitterer  and  a  deeper  wave,  and  still  a 
wave  yet  bitterer  and  deeper ;  and  so  when  I  read  this  story,  I 
confess  it  masters  me  and  robs  me  of  judgment,  and  that  here 
the  poet  makes  me  wholly  his  own,  and  does  as  he  will  with  me, 
going  beyond  and  outside  all  criticism.  But  when  I  turn  to 
"  Macbeth,"  I  find  an  influence  of  as  strong  a  nature,  though 
widely  diverse.  Let  us  pause  for  a  moment  here,  to  notice  how 
vastly  the  philosophic,  quiet,  meditative  hero  of  Shakespeare 
differs  from  the  "  pitiful  craven"  of  the  stage  Macbeth.  There 
is  no  doubt  in  my  mind  that  Shakespeare  had  in  some  sort  a 
national  portrait  in  his  mind  when  he  drew  the  character.  Mac- 
beth is  essentially  a  Scotchman,  a  reflective,  wary,  careful  man^ 
not  by  any  means  the  unmeasured  villain  many  conceive  him  as 
being;  but  he  is,  in  no  light,  the  center  of  the  play.  By  a  stroke 
oi  genius,  which  is  to  the  full  as  daring  as  it  is  effective,  the 
place  of  first  villain  is  given  to  a  woman.  It  is  worth  notice 
that  the  great  among  men  are  remarkable  for  the  chivalric  ten- 
derness with  which  they  write  of  women ;  and  in  an  age  when 
men  and  women  alike  are  doing  their  best  to  put  an  end  to  this 
old-fashioned  and  noble  sentiment,  it  is  well  to  notice  how  com- 
pletely it  governs  most  of  the  female  creations  of  Shakespeare. 
It  is  all  the  more  noteworthy  here,  because  of  the  direct  con- 
trast ;  but  it  was  necessary  among  women  as  among  men  that 
the  poet  should  run  through  the  whole  gamut  of  possible  char- 
acter. Terrible  as  she  is.  Lady  Macbeth  is  still  a  woman ;  but 
she  is  such  a  woman  as  no  other  than  Shakespeare  could  have 
painted  without  portraying  a  fiend.  True  to  the  instinct  of  his 
art,  the  poet  strikes  the  key-note  of  this  play  in  the  first  scene, 
and  the  very  stage  description — "  a  blasted  heath" — leads  the 
mind  naturally  to  the  horror  of  the  theme.  As  I  read  "  Mac- 
beth," with  its  wild  witch-lore,  its  strange,  supernatural  ma- 
chinery, its  strong  reversal  of  the  ordinary  relations  of  man 


128  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and  woman,  and  its  overmastering  weirdness  of  incident  and 
intention ;  when  I  see  how  inexorable  as  fate  the  dark  doctrines 
of  evil  close  around  the  central  figures  in  the  drama ;  when  I 
see  the  poor  thane  at  his  glory's  height,  and  on  the  very  edge 
of  the^  precipice  from  which  he  must  fall  at^ast;  when  I  hear  him 
in  the  utterance  of  those  moralizings  which  are  now  in  every 
schoolboy's  memory,  and  which  are  among  the  saddest  verses 
in  our  language;  when,  turning  from  these  details,  I  lay  down 
the  book,  the  whole  great  structure  of  the  poet's  theme  looks 
out  upon  me,  weird,  majestic,  massive,  overwhelming;  like  a 
great  deserted  stronghold  in  a  lonely  land,  with  the  darkness  of 
night  upon  it,  and  the  very  desolation  of  woe  dwelling,  as  a 
shadow,  upon  the  landscape  that  surrounds  it. 

Let  us  next  turn  for  a  few  moments  to  "  Hamlet."  The  spe- 
cial fascination  of  this  play  is,  that  every  one  who  reads  it  with 
any  degree  of  enthusiasm  or  appreciation  has,  at  one  time  or 
other,  been  a  Hamlet  to  himself.  There  is  no  man  nor  woman, 
who  is  capable  of  understanding  this  drama,  who  has  not  been 
troubled  with  those  restless  longings  of  the  souli  and  those  trials 
of  the  affections,  which  make  up  the  sum  of  the  sufferings  of  the 
Prince  of  Denmark.  "Who'ld  these  fardels  bearf*  Have  we 
not  all  borne  them,  "and  felt  the  burden  ?  "To  grunt  and  sweat 
under  a  weary  life ;"  is  not  this  the  lot  of  many,  if  not  of  the  most  ? 
And  that  far-reaching  thought  of  sadness,  **  I  could  be  content 
to  be  bounded  in  a  nutshell,  but  that  I  have  bad  dreams,"  is 
familiar  to  us  all.  Here,  then,  is  the  man'^el,  that  in  the  charac- 
ter of  a  prince  and  a  scholar — young,  accomplished,  powerful,  and 
flattered — the  great  art-master  has  given  us  each  a  portrait  of 
ourselves.  Of  all  his  human  pictures  this  is  the  greatest  and 
the  most  human— possibly  the  saddest  of  all.  And  yet,  though 
this  gigantic  sorrow  runs,  like  the  undertone  of  a  distant  ocean, 
through  the  greatest  of  Shakespeare's  plays,  there  never  was  a 
mind  less  essentially  morbid  than  his.  Witness  his  great,  whole- 
some, hearty  good  humor :  "  Shall  there  be  no  more  cakes  and 
ale.^"    Hear  Sir  Toby,  as  at  midriight,  "mellow  ripe,"  he  goes 


THE   STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE,  I29 

homeward,  inviting  his  companions  thus:  "Shall  we  arouse  the 
night-owl  in  a  catch  that  wilf  draw  three  souls  out  of  one  wea- 
ver?" Just  fancy  that ;  think  of  the  weaver,  a  poor,  wizened, 
weak  creature,  with  scarce  half  a  soul  to  boast  of;  but  the  mer- 
riment of  Sir  Toby's  song  shall  be  so  exuberant  that  out  of  this 
starved  creature's  carcass  it  shall  draw  three  souls !  Can  the  wit 
of  jollity  and  good  humor  go  further  than  this  ? 

Throughout  the  historical  plays,  what  strikes  us  most  promi- 
nently is  the  feeling  oi\iKt2x\,y  patriotism  which  blows  over  them 
like  a  fresh  and  health-giving  breeze.  Shakespeare  gloried  in 
his  England,  and  the  pride  he  had  in  his  countrymen  shines 
out  nobly  on  all  occasions.  "  And  you  yeomen,  whose  limbs 
were  made  in  England;"  there  is  no  half-heart  in  that  line.  In 
the  bead-roll  of  names  that  runs  down  the  young  King's  speech 
on  the  eve  of  St.  Crispin,  there  is  no  one  that  does  not  awake 
historic  recollections;  and  the'  splendid  surety  for  the  future 
which  the  speech  displays  justifies  itself  in  the  pride  and  exulta- 
tions of  a  thousand  hearts,  awakened  from  the  sluggish  selfish- 
ness of  every  day  to  a  wide  and  noble  patriotism.  Where  shall 
we  fine}  a  chronicler  like  Shakespeare?  De  Quincey  calls  him 
"the  great  protagonist  in  the  arena  of  modern /.'7^/r/ ,•"  but  we 
equally  award  to  him  the  palm  as  the  great  protagonist  in  the 
arena  of  history ;  for  the  true  end  of  history  is  not  so  much  to 
teach  the  dry  facts  of  genealogy  and  chronology  as  to  warn 
from  evil  and  inspffe  to  good  ;  and  never  came  there  a  master 
of  the  art  who  could  do  these  things  as  Shakespeare  has  done 
them. 

When  we  turn  our  mind  to  those  fourteen  immortal  composi- 
tions that  are  called  "  the  comedies,"  how  shall  we  know  where 
to  begin,  or  how  to  end,  in  speaking  of  them  ?  Here  also  the 
same  critical  incapacity  pursues  us:  we  cannot  tell  which  is 
finest :  the  finest  is  always  that  which  is  last  rend.  The  rollick- 
ing humor  of  "Taming  of  the  Shrew;"  the  wild  fiin  of  the  "Com- 
edy of  Errors ;"  the  sweet,  breezy  charm  of  "  As  You  Like  It ;" 
the  genial  wit  and  society  satire  of  "Love's  Labor's  Lost;"  the 
L.  M.  8.-5 


I30  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

beauty  of  all  these  leaves  us  no  power  of  choice.  Jolly  Sir  Toby- 
Belch,  the  stately  Malvolio,  "  that  cross-gartered  gull,"  the  two 
faithful  good-natured  Dromios,  gentle  Lady  Olivia,  dear  Viola, 
sad  Hermione,  jealous  suffering  Leontes,  and  that  flabbiest  of 
all  gentlemen,  Sir  Andrew  Aguecheek ;  why,  here  is  such  a  wealth 
and  variety  of  character  as  fairly  bewilders  us  in  choice;  we  suf- 
fer from  a  very  embarrassment  of  riches.  And  even  now  we 
have  left  out  the  king  of  all  Shakespeare's  humorous  creations, 
the  jolly  Falstaff — the  fat  *'  Sir  John" — who  is  a  host,  an  army 
in  himself,  and  who  has  more  genuine  fun  in  him  than  all  the 
characters  of  all  other  writers  of  comedy  put  together — the  very- 
personification  of  good  humor.  These  things  go  beyond  us; 
and  from  whatever  point  we  review  them,  we  stand  amazed  at 
the  inexhaustible  riches  of  this  one  master-mind. 

Among  the  innumerable  felicities  of  Shakespeare,  I  have 
always  esteemed  it  one,  that  his  birthday  falls  amid  the  birth 
time  of  the  year;  his  advent  is  connected  with  the  advent  of 
spring.  We  mingle  our  greetings  of  the  great  joy-bringer  with 
our  greetings  of  the  season  of  hope  and  joy.  We  hold  the 
closest  communion  with  him  at  the  very  time  when  we  begin  to 
hold  intercourse  with  nature ;  we  have  the  keenest  sense  of  his 
quickening  and  gladdening  influence  when  we  rejoice  beneath 
her  quickening  and  enlivening  power.  We  celebrate  his  birth, 
we  especially  cherish  his  memory,  and  feel  his  presence,  when 
we  begin  to  live  our  out  of-door  life,  when  we  first  go  forth  into 
the  woods  and  fields,  and  draw  our  first  delight  therefrom. 
Shakespeare  loved  the  country.  Throughout  his  works,  espe- 
cially in  the  comedies,  he  delights  to  bring  his  characters  into 
close  relation  with  nature;  and  to  carry  on  the  action  amid  syl- 
van pleasures  and  rural  sights  and  sounds.  He  rarely  indulges 
in  elaborate  description  ;  but  many  of  his  scenes,  and  some 
w^hole  plays,  breathe  the  very  spirit  of  the  meadow  and  the 
woodland,  the  mountain  and  the  sea-shore.  He  carried  with 
him  to  London  the  vivid  pictures  of  his  youthful  rambles  over 
the  verdurous  hills  and  glades  of  Warwickshire ;  his  imagina- 


THE   STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.  I3I 

tion  delighted  to  retrace  them  on  every  possible  occasion ;  and 
we  see  them  reflected  in  the  exiled  Duke  and  the  King  of  Na- 
varre, in  Miranda  and  Imogen  and  Perdita,  in  Autolycus  and  in 
Touchstone.  But  in  six  of  the  plays,  in  *•  Love's  Labor's  Lost," 
in  "  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,''  in  "  As  You  Like  It,"  in  "  The 
Tempest,"  in  "  Cymbeline,"  and  in  "  Winter's  Tale,"  he  makes 
nature  the  pervading  presence  and  the  potent  minister.  The 
entire  environment — the  setting  or  frame-work  of  the  characters 
in  these  plays — is  either  wholly  or  mainly  or  largely  sylvan  and 
rural ;  the  life  set  before  us  is  life  out  of  doors ;  men  and  women 
make  mirth  or  make  love;  give  play  to  their  humors,  their  pas- 
sions, their  activity,  in  the  fields,  amid  the  woods,  upon  the 
mountains,  or  beside  the  sea.  And  it  is  remarkable  that  of  these 
six  dramas,  three  of  the  best  were  written  after  the  poet  had 
quitted  the  ambitions  and  turmoils  of  the  city,  and  gone  down  to 
spend  his  declining  years  amid  the  scenes  of  his  youth  at  Strat- 
ford. We  may  well  imagine  him,  on  the  banks  of  his  beloved 
Avon — 

When  daisies  pied,  and  violets  blue. 

And  lady-smocks  all  silver  white, 
And  cuckoo-buds  of  yellow  hue, 

Do  paint  the  meadows  with  delight ; 

where,  fatigued  perhaps  with  his  rambles,  he  finds  an  arbpr 
in  which  to  repose;  or,  it  may  be,  in  some  shady  nook,  he 
knows — 

A  bank  where  the  wild  thyme  blows, 
Where  oxlips,  and  the  nodding  violet  grows. 
Quite  over-canopied  with  luscious  woodbine. 
With  sweet  musk  roses,  and  with  eglantine  : 

there,  lulled  to  sleep  by  the  hum  of  bees,  the  songs  of  birds,  and 
the  murmur  of  the  river,  the  "  spirits  of  dreams"  appear,  and  set 
before  him  his  own  immortal  creations — past,  present,  and  to 
come.  This  is  no  fancy  sketch ;  for  as  these  characters,  singly 
or  in  groups^  exult  or  lament,  sing  or  soliloquize,  around  him,  a 
"recording  angel"  is  at  hand  to  write  down,  in  congenial  num- 


132;  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

bers,  their  sayings  and  their  doings,  for  the  delight  and  instruc- 
tion of  after  ages. 

Did  time  permit,  it  would  be  an  interesting  task  to  analyze  the 
dramas  I  have  mentioned,  and  mark  the  influence  of  nature  and 
the  use  the  poet  makes  of  it  in  them.  But  you  can  do  this,  each 
for  himself.  In  *'  As  You  Like  It,"  for  example,  you  will  note 
that  this  out-of-door  nature  is  set  before  us  as  a  purifying  and 
restoring  power,  as  a  calmer  of  troubled  thoughts,  a  healer  of 
broken  hearts,  a  harmonizer  of  distracted  lives.  The  cares  and 
splendors,  the  vices -and  miseries,  of  the  court  are  contrasted  with 
the  innocence,  simplicity,  and  peace  of  the  country.  The  forest 
of  Arden  is  not  only  a  happy  region,  where  exiles  find  a  home, 
and  captives  rejoice  in  liberty ;  where  the  persecuted  find  shel- 
ter, and  the  aflfiicted  gain  comfort;  it  is  likewise  a  delightful 
school,  a  scene  of  discipline,  and  a  place  of  reformation.  Almost 
every  personage  in  the  play  is  happier  and  better  for  a  sojourn 
in  the  forest.  In  the  palace  of  the  reigning  Duke,  we  have  sus- 
picion, hatred,  and  wretchedness,  while  contentment,  peace>  and 
tenderness  reign  in  the  cave  of  his  banished  brother : 

Hath  not  old  custom  made  this  life  more  sweet 
Than  that  of  painted  pomp  ?    Are  not  these  woods 
More  free  from  peril  than  the  envious  Court  ? 
And  this  our  life,  exempt  from  public  haunt. 
Finds  good  m  everything. 

The  difference  between  the  house  of  Oliver  and  the  shades  of 
Arden  is  the  difference  between  Hell  and  Paradise.  Rosalind  and 
Celia  do  their  best  to  look  mirthful  and  appear  happy  at  Court,  but 
they  only  feel  true  happiness,  and  break  forth  into  hearty  mirth, 
in  *'  the  sheep-cote  fenced  about  with  olive  trees."  Orlando, 
"cribbed,  cabined,  and  confined,"  oppressed  and  ensnared  at 
home,  expands  into  the  fullness  of  his  noble  nature  amid  the 
congenial  amplitude  and  freedom  of  Arden.  Dispatched  on  an 
evil  errand;  Oliver  enters  the  blessed  region  to  be  reformed. 
Bent  on  purposes  of  destruction,  Duk^  Frederick  approaches  the 
happy  forest  to  be  disarmed  and  converted.    We  feel  inclined  to 


THE   STUDY  OF  SHAKESPEARE.  133 

condole  with  the  rightful  Duke  on  the  recovery  of  his  dukedom, 
to  be  sorry  at  his  transfer  from  the  cave  to  the  Court ;  and  we 
sincerely  regret  when  the  pure  and  peaceful  life  at  Arden  comes 
to  an  end. 

Before  closing  my  address,  I  wish  to  ask  your  attention  to  a 
fact  which  I  think  will  interest  you,  and  one  that  has  not,  I 
believe,  hitherto  been  suggested  by  any  critic  or  commentator. 
The  second  or  1632  folio,  before  it  went  to  press,  evidently  passed 
through  the  hands  of  some  competent  editor,  who  corrected  a 
large  number  of  the  flagrant  typographical  and  other  errors 
of  the  original  1623  edition.  And  although  these  corrections 
and  improvements  possess  for  us  little  authority  in  regulating 
the  text,  many  being  evidently  explanatory  sophistications,  and 
others  mere  modernizations  of  the  spelling  and  phraseology, 
while  almost  as  many  new  errors  disfigure  the  second  edition  as 
are  corrected  in  the  first,  still  they  plainly  show  that  some  one 
beside  the  proof-reader  revised  the  book  with  care  and  rever- 
ence. Who  this  editor  was  has  never  been  ascertained ;  but 
from  various  concurrent  circumstances,  I  have  recently  become 
convinced  that  it  was  the  poet  John  Milton,  He  was  at  that 
time  in  London,  engaged  in  just  such  literary  employment;  he 
was  twenty- four  years  of  age,  an  enthusiastic  scholar,  a  poet, 
and  a  lover  of  dramatic  art ;  and  he  had  not  yet  been  baptized 
in  the  bitter  waters  of  Puritanism,  that  overflowed  the  country 
a  few  years  later — a  baptism  that  soured  his  disposition,  effaced 
his  charity,  and,  I  cannot  but  believe,  rendered  unhappy  his 
declining  years.  That  he  loved  Shakespeare  we  are  well  assured 
from  his  splendid  panegyric  on  the  poet  that  first  appeared  in 
this  very  second  folio,  and  which  I  am  almost  confident  he  wrote 
expressly  to  prefix  to  this  folio,  after  he  had  completed  his  labors 
in  revising  it.  In  the  folio  it  appears  without  date  or  signature; 
but  it  was  published  subsequently  in  a  volume  of  minor  poems 
by  Milton,  issued  in  1645 ;  and  there  it  bears  the  date  of  1631.  This 
glowing  eulogy,  the  whole-souled  expression  of  the  young  poet's 
unbigoted  and  unprejudiced  heart,  one  cannot  help  contrasting 


.134  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

with  the  fact  that  in  his  after-life  he  sets  it  down  among  the 
sins  and  follies  of  King  Charles  that  he  gave  a  portion  of  his 
time  to  reading  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  !  It  was  a  congenial 
and  consistent  thing  that,  before  prejudice  and  Puritanism  had 
warped  his  generous  nature,  one  transcendent  genius  should  set 
the  seal  of  his  approval  upon  the  works  of  another  genius  still 
,  more  transcendent ;  and  that  upon  the  greatest  iri  his  country's 
literary  annals,  the  second  greatest  should  write  that  noble 
epitaph : 

What  neede  my  Shakespeare  for  his  honor'd  bones 

The  labor  of  an  age  in  piled  stones. 

Or  that  his  hallowM  Reliques  should  be  hid 

Under  a  starrey-pointing  Pyramid  ? 

Dear  Son  of  Memory,  grat  Heire  of  Fame^ 

What  needst  thou  such  dull  witnesse  of  thy  Name  ? 

Thou  in  our  wonder  and  astonishment 

Hast  built  thy  selfe  a  lasting  monument ; 

For  whilst  to  th'  shame  of  slow-endeavoring  Art, 

Thy  easie  numbers  flow,  and  that  each  heart 

Hath,  from  the  leaves  of  thy  unvalued  Booke, 

Those  Delphic  Lines  with  deep  impression  tooke ; 

Then  thou,  our  fancy  of  its  selfe  bereaving. 

Dost  make  us  Marble  with  too  much  conceiving ; 

And,  so  Sepulcher'd  m  such  pompc  dost  lie. 

That  Kings  for  such  a  Tombe  would  wish  to  die. 

I  have  now  exhausted  my  time,  and  I  fear  more  than  ex- 
hausted your  patience,  with  these  desultory  reflections.  In  con- 
clusion, let  us  all  devputly  thank  God  for  the  unspeakable  gift 
of  Shakespeare ;  the  rich  legacy  of  whose  imperishable  works 
has  made  us  better  men  and  happier,  better  citizens,  and  better 
Christians.  With  each  returning  year,  let  us  never  omit  to  show 
our  gratitude,  bj''  meeting  thus  together  and  celebrating  the 
anniversary  of  his  birth;  by  cordially  and  sincerely  loving  each 
other;  and  by  excluding  from  our  studies  and  our  intercourse  all 
bickerings  and  jealousies  and  animosities;  and  so  shall  we  set  an 
example  to  our  brethren  of  the  "  New  Shakspere  Society"  across 
the  Atlantic,  some  of  whom  seem  of  late  to  have  forgotten  the  pre- 
cepts and  example  of  their  master,  who  was  hailed  by  all  as  the 


THE  STUDY  OE  SHAKESPEARE,  135 

"gentle"  Shakespeare.  There  is  no  fear  that  we  shall,  any  of 
us,  study  and  enjoy  this  legacy  too  much,  Ben  Jonson  said  that 
"he  loved  the  man,  on  this  side  idolatry,  as  much  as  any."  If 
wc  out-vie  old  Ben,  and  make  him  our  supreme  intellectual 
idol,  it  is  an  idolatry  that  will  be  as  'profitable,  as  it  is  sweet  and 
reverential.  See  what  he  has  done  for  the  world  to  claim  this 
homage!  Has  he  not  set  the  English  tongue  to  music?  Has 
he  not  taught  lovers  more  about  love  than  lovers  know  ?  And 
Emerson  goes  so  far  as  to  ask,  **  What  maiden  has  not  found 
Shakespeareyf//^r  than  her  delicacy?"  Has  he  not  taught  the 
orator  more  artifices  and  more  arts  than  the  orator  knew  ?  Has 
he  not  framed  the  most  adroit  speech  in  history?  Has  he  not 
taught  king  and  politician  ?  Do  not  sages  come  to  him  for  wis- 
dom, and  humorists  cluster  around  Falstaff  for  sallies  of  wit? 
Have  not  his  myriad  eyes  seen  more  of  men  and  women,  and 
read  the  secret  hopes  and  fears  and  inspirations  of  the  human 
heart  more  truly  and  keenly  than  any  one,  save  the  great  Crea- 
tor of  them  all  ?  Of  him  it  may  ba  truly  said,  as  it  was  of  Plato, 
that  the  gods,  if  they  were  to  return  to  earth,  would  speak  the 
language  of  Shakespeare.  Poets  come  and  poets  go ;  and  it  is 
not  likely  that  the  world  will  ever  be  without  a  laureate  or  a 
Longfellow,  a  Browning  or  a  Whittier,  a  Lowell  or  a  Leighton. 
These  poets  are  to  us  as  patterns  which  we  may  copy.     We  imi- 

1  tate  the  polish  of  Pope,  the  impassioned  grace  of  Byron,  the 
mellifluous  cadence  of  Tennyson ;  and  although  we  fall  far  short 
of  success,  we  perceive  no  impertinence  in  the  attempt.  How 
different  the  feelings  with  which  we  approach  Shakespeare.  To 
imitate  hiin  would  be  a  folly  that  scarce  ignorance  itself  would 
entertain.  The  higher  we  rise  in  intellectual  advance,  the  more 
clearly  we  see  his  greatness,  and  the  more  reverent  is  our  love. 
Shall  we  ever  have  another  Shakespeare  ?  Is  it  probable  we 
shall  ever  look  upon  his  like  again  ?  I  think  not ;  for  genius,  as 
transcendent  as  was  that  possessed  by  Shakespeare,  seems  to  be 

r  more  closely  allied  to  the  divine  nature  than  that  allotted  to 
ordinary  men :  it  is  lent  to  the  world  but  once ;  and  when  it  has 


136  TUE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

accomplished  its  work  upon  earth,  it  ascends  to  its  home  among 
the  immortal,  and  draws  the  ladder  up  after  it, 

Joseph  Crosby. 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD. 

"  It  would,"  says  Sydney  Smith,  in  his  "  Culture  of  the  Under- 
standing," "  be  a  profitable  thing  to  draw  up  a  short  and  well- 
authenticated  account  of  the  habits  of  study  of  the  most  cele- 
brated writers.  It  would  go  far  to  destroy  the  absurd  and 
pernicious  associations  of  genius  and  idleness,  by  showing  that 
men  of  the  most  brilliant  and  imposing  talents  have  lived  a  life 
of  intense  and  mcessant  labor."  Such  an  account  would  indeed 
be  peculiarly  valuable,  and  its  value  would  be  of  a  twofold  char- 
acter. It  would  be  at  once  instructive  and  suggestive,  for  it 
would  go  far  to  prove  that  genius  is,  as  Buflfon  and  Johnson 
boldly  defined  it,  the  capacity  for  concentrated  labor.  It  would 
be  eminently  curious  and  interesting,  for  it  would  be  such  a 
record  of  whims,  caprices,  and  eccentricities  as  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  parallel  outside  the  walls  of  a  madhouse.  It  would  be  a 
perpetual  succession  of  surprises  and  paradoxes.  We  shpuld 
find  that  in  the  race  for  fame  the  hares  have  been  the  tortoises, 
and  the  tortoises  have  been  the  hares.  We  should  find  men, 
who  are  in  their  works  the  very  embodiment  of  hard  and  logical 
propriety,  guilty,  during  the  process  of  producing  these  works, 
of  oddities  at  which  Malvolio  would  have  blushed.  We  should 
be  shocked  to  discover  that  "rapt  orations  flowing  free"  have 
been  worked  out  like  mathematical  problems,  that  fervid  a|X)s- 
trophes  have  been  compiled,  and  that  laborious  dissertations 
have  been  extemporized.  Such  an  account  would,  however,  be 
a  very  difficult  task.  Authors  are  not  fond  of  being  discovered 
in  undress.  What  goes  on  in  the  work-room  is,  as  a  rule,  jeal- 
ously concealed.    Genius,  like  the  Nile,  keeps  its  springs  secret. 


GBNIUS  AND  METHOD.  137 

Few  authors  have  the  courage  to  unfold  the  genesis  of  their 
creations,  as  Edgar  Poe  has  done,  and  when  they  have  left  us 
their  autobio;^raphies,  they  have  for  the  most  part  been  careful 
not  to  impair  the  effect  of  their  work  by  showing  us  any  of  the 
scaffolding ;  the  vanity  which  has  led  them  to  record  the  most 
trivial  incidents  in  their  pilgrimage  through  life,  has  led  them 
to  throw  a  veil  over  the  arcana  of  the  studio.  It  is  only,  there- 
fore, by  searching  in  obscure  corners,  in  ana  and  anecdotes,  in 
familiar  letters,  in  diaries,  and  in  the  by-paths  of  literary  tradi- 
tion, that  this  interesting  chapter  in  the  curiosities  of  literature 
could  with  any  thoroughness  be  written.  That  D'Israeli  should 
have  omitted  to  supply  it  is  much  to  be  regretted,  as  he  pos- 
sessed singular  qualifications  for*  the  task,  as  well  from  his  dis- 
cursive and  recondite  erudition  as  from  his  custom  of  collecting 
and  noting  down  such  minutiae  whenever  he  encountered  them. 
We  trust,  therefore,  that  this  short  sketch,  slight  and  superficial 
though  it  be,  will  not  be  without  interest  to  our  readers. 

We  wjU  divide  it  into  three  parts:  the  method  of  authors; 
the  whims  of  authors;  the  circumstances  under  which  great 
works  have  been  produced. 

Meditation  and  toil — meditatio  et  labor — are,  according  to 
Tacitus,  the  only  passports  to  literary  immortality,  and  with 
some  few  exceptions  the  dogma  of  the  great  historian  will  be 
found  to  hold  good.  "Nothing  great  and  durable,"  says  Tom 
Moore,  "  has  ever  been  produced  with  ease.  Labor  Is  the  parent 
of  all  the  lasting  monuments  of  this  world,  whether  in  verse  or 
in  stone,  in  poetry  or  in  pyramids,"  and  first  among  the  sons  of 
toil  stands  Virgil.  It  was  his  custom,  Donatus  tells  us.  to  throw 
off  a  number  of  verses  in  the  morning  and  to  employ  the  rest 
of  the  day  in  polishing  and  in  pruning  them  down.  It  took  him 
upwards  of  three  years  to  compose  his  ten  short  *'  Eclogues," 
seven  years  to  write  his  "Georgics,"  which  comprise  little  more 
than  two  thousand  lines,  and  upwards  of  twelve  years  to  elabo- 
rate the  "^neid,"  which  he  was  so  far  from  regarding  as  com- 
plete that  lie  attempted  to  rise  from  his  death-bed  to  commit  it 


138  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

to  the  flames.  Every  line  of  "  Horace"  bfears  testimony  to  the 
fastidious  labor  of  its  author.  There  are,  sayg  Lord  Lytton, 
single  odes  which  must  have  cost  the  poet  six  weeks'  seclusion^ 
from  the  dissipations  of  Ronie.  Lucretius's  one  poem  repre- 
sents the  work  of  a  whole  life,  and  he  has  himself  told  us  how 
completely  he  was  absorbed  in  it,  how  it  filled  his  waking  hours, 
how  it  haunted  him  in  his  dreams.  / 

Thucydides  was  at  least  twenty  years  in  inditing  his  great 
work,  and  that  work  is  comprised  in  an  octavo  volume.  Demos- 
thenes made  no  secret  of  the  pains  he  expended  in  forging  his 
thunderbolts  a.^ainst  Philip  and  -^schines;  Diodorus  informs 
us  that  he  was  thirty  years  in  composing  his  history:  and  so 
fastidious  was  Plato  that  the  first  sentence  in  the  "  Republic" 
was  turned  into  nine  different  ways  before  he  could  satisfy  him- 
self. If  we  are  to  believe  Quintilian,  Isocrates  was  no  less  than 
ten  years  on  his  "  Panegyric."  Giannone  was  engaged  for  nearly 
the  same  period  over  his  **  History  of  Naples."  Boileau  and 
Pope  would  spend  whole  days  over  a  couplet,  Charlotte^  Bront6 
an  hour  over  a  word,  and  Gray  a  month  over  a  short  copy  of 
verses.  There  is  a  poem  of  ten  lines  in  Waller  which  he  has 
owned  cost  him  a  whole  summer.  Gibbon  wrote  the  first  chap- 
ter of  the  "  Decline  and  Fall "  three  times  before  he  was  satisfied 
with  it,  and  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  elapsed  before  the 
entire  work  was  completed.  John  Foster  the  essayist  would 
sometimes  linger  a  week  over  a  sentence.  Addison  was  so  fas- 
tidious that  Johnson  tells  us  he  would  stop  the  press  to  insert 
an  epithet  or  even  a  comma.  Sainte-Beuve  expended  incredible 
pains  on  every  word  in  his  famous  "  Causeries,"  and  four  or  ^\^ 
octavo  pages  were  in  his  estimation  a  good  week's  work.  "  You 
will  read  this  treatise  in  a  few  hours,"  says  Montesquieu  in  a 
letter  to  one  of  his  friends,  "  but  the  labor  expended  on  it  has 
whitened  my  hair."  Locke  was  no  less  than  eighteen  years 
over  his  essay.  Tasso  toiled  like  a  galley  slave  at  polishing  his 
stanzas.  So  morbidly  anxious  was  Cardinal  Bembo  about  style 
♦hat  every  poem  on  which  he  was  engaged  passed  successively 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD.  139 

through  forty  portfolios,  which  represented  its  various  stages 
toward  perfection.  Pascal's  diligence  passed  into  a  proverb. 
Cardinal  Polignac's  "Anti-Lucretius,"  one  of  the  finest  Latin 
poems  that  modern  Europe  has  produced,  was  the  fruit  of 
twenty  years*  incessant  revision,  and  what  applies  to  Polignac 
applies  also  to  the  "  De  Partu  Virginis"  of  Sannazarius.  How 
Petrarch  labored  at  his  sonnets  may  be  gathered  from  the  fol- 
lowing memoranda,  which  were  found  on  the  original  manu- 
script ofone  of  them.  We  adopt  the  translation  of  Ugo  Fos-  . 
colb: 

I  b^an  this  by  the  impulse  of  the  Lord,  loth  of  September,  at  the  dawn  of  day 
after  my  morning  prayers.  .  .  .  1  rau^t  make  these  two  verses  over  again,  singing 
them  (cantando),  and  1  must  transpose  them.  Three  o'ctock  a.m.,  19th  of  October. 
...  I  Hke  this.  30th  of  October,  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning.  .  .  .  No,  this  does 
not  please  me.  aoth  of  December,  in  the  evening.  ...  I  shall  return  to  this  again, 
I  am  called  to  supper.  .  .  .  i8th  of  February,  towards  noon;  this  is  now  well ;  how- 
ever, look  at  it  again. 

And  this  is  the  history  of  one  sonnet.  Such  is  the  labor  of 
those  who  write  for  immortality ! 

The  amount  of  toil  expended  by  Sheridan  on  his  comedies 
was  almost  incredible;  every  joke,  every  epigram,  was  as  care- 
fully elaborated  as  a  paragraph  in  Gibbon;  his  easy,  sparkling 
dialogue  was  little  better  than  mosaic  work  painfully  dovetailed. 
Those  who  would  know  the  price  at  which  Sheridan's  fame  is 
purchased  would  do  well  to  consult  the  fifth  chapter  in  the  sec- 
ond volume  of  Moore's"  Life"  of  him.  The  translation  of  Quin- 
tus  Curtius  by  Claude  Vaugelas,  which  was  pronounced  by 
Voltaire  to  be  a  model  of  classical  composition,  occupied  its 
author  for  thirty  years.  John  Lewes  Balzac  averaged  a  week 
to  a  page ;  Malherbe's  fastidious  diligence  is  illustrated  by  an 
anecdote  which  is  worth  repeating.  A  French  nobleman  had 
lost  his  wife,  was  inconsolable  for  her  death,  and,  anxious  to 
commemorate  her  virtues,  employed  Malherbe  to  dedicate  an 
ode  to  her  memory.  The  poet,  though  not  needy,  was  by  no 
means  averse  XX>  receiving  the  haodsome  fee  which  was,  on  the 


I40  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

completion  of  the  task,  to  reward  his  pains.  Tliree  years  elapsed 
before  he  could  finish  tha  verses  to  his  satisfaction,  but  just  as 
he  was  about  to  present  it  he  was  disgusted  to  discover  that  his 
patron  had  solaced  himself  v/ith  a  second  wife,  and  there  was 
nothing  for  it  but  for  the  unfortunate  bard  to  turn  his  elegy 
into  an  epithalamium,  or  forfeit  his  fee.  Among  our  own  writ- 
ers. Gray,  Miss  Austen,  Charlotte  Bront6,  and  Charles  James 
Fox  were  conspicuously  distinguished  by  their  morbid  sensibil- 
ity to  the  niceties  of  style,  and  it  is  strange  also  to  find  in  this 
class  old  Isaak  Walton,  whose  simple  homely  diction  was,«it 
appears,  the  result  of  almost  incredible  labor.  Even  Goldsmith 
had  bemoaned  the  trouble  his  graceful  periods  cost  him.  "  Every 
one,"  he  once  said  bitterly,  "writes  better  because  he  writes 
faster  than  I."  The  account  given  by  Rosseau  of  the  labor  his 
smooth  and  lively  style  cost  him,  is  so  curious  that  we  shall  let 
him  tell  his  own  tale : 

My  manuscripts  blotted,  scratched,  interlined,  and  scarcely  legible,  attest  the 
trouble  they  cost  me.  There  is  not  one  of  them  which  I  have  not  been  obliged  to 
transcribe  four  or  five  times  before  it  went  to  press.  I  could  never  do  anything  when 
placed  at  a  table  pen  in  hand :  it  must  be  walking  among  the  rocks  or  in  the  woods ; 
it  is  at  night  in  my  bed,  during  my  wakeful  hours,  that  I  compose — it  may  be  judged 
how  slowly,  particularly  for  a  man  who  has  not  the  advantage  of  verbal  memory. 
Some  of  my  periods  I  have  turned  or  re-turned  in  my  head  for  five  or  six  nights 
before  they  were  fit  to  be  put  to  paper. 

Some  authors,  on  the  other  hand,  have  been  endowed  with 
preternatural  fluency,  a  quality  which  found,  however,  little  favor 
in  the  eyes  of  the  critics  of  antiquity. 

Ennius,  the  Roman  Chaucer,  wrote  with  astonishing  rapidity, 
and  Lucilius  with  such  case  that  he  boasted  he  could  turn  off 
two  hundred  verses  while  standing  on  one  leg.  Statius  also 
appears  to  have  been  endowed  with  preternatural  facility.  In 
Cicero  and  Livy  the  faculty  of  eloquent  expression  resembled 
an  instinct,  though  Cicero  tells  us  that  with  him.  at  least,  it  was 
partly  the  result  of  sleepless  diligence  during  the  days  of  his 
literary  apprenticeship.  In  one  year  Dryden  produced  four  of 
his  greatest  works,  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel,"  '*  The  Medal," 


GENIUS  And  method.  141 

"The  Religio  Laici,"  and  "  Mac  Flecknoe."  He  was  only  six 
months  in  writing  "  The  Ffciid  and  Panther,"  three  years  in 
translating  the  whole  of  "Virgil,"  and  twelve  mornings  in  com- 
posing his  "  Parallel  between  Poetry  and  Painting."  The  orig- 
inal draught  of  "  Alexander's  Feast"  was  struck  off  at  a  single 
sitting.  Dr.  Johnson's  "  Rasselas"  was  written  in  a  week  to 
defray  the  expenses  of  his  mother's  funeral.  Sir  Walter  Scott's 
rapidity  is  one  of  the  marvels  of  literature;  he  wrote  literally 
as  fast  as  the  pen  could  move,  and  when  he  dictated,  his  aman- 
uensis could  scarcely  keep  pace  with  him,  The  original  manu- 
scripts of  the  Waverley  novels  may  still  be  seen  ;  they  are 
frequently  for  many  pages  undeformed  by  a  single  blot  or  era- 
sure. Beckford*s  "Vathek"  was  composed  by  the  unbroken 
exertion  of  three  whole  days  and  two  whole  nights,  the  author 
supporting  himself  during  his  unnatural  vigil  by  copious 
draughts  of  wine,  and  what  adds  to  the  wonder  is  that  the 
work  was  written  in  French.  Mrs.  Browning's  "  Lady  Geral- 
dine's  Courtship,"  a* poem  of  great  length  in  a  peculiarly  diffi- 
cult meter,  was  completed  m  twelve  hours,  while  the  printer  was 
waiting  to  put  it  into  type.  Sir  Walter  Scott  tells  us  that  Mickle 
— the  translator  of  the  "  Lusiad,"  and  the  author  *of  the  beauji- 
ful  ballad  which  suggested  the  romance  of  "  Ken il worth" — fre- 
quently dispensed  with  manuscript  altoi^ether,  and  "  set  up"  his 
poems  himself, "  hot  from  the  brain."  Most  of  our  Elizabethan 
dramatists  were  remarkable  for  the  ease  and  rapidity  with  which 
they  wrote.  One  of  them,  old  Hey  wood,  was  the  author,  "  part 
or  entire,"  of  two  hundred  and  thirty  plays.  It  is  mteresting  to 
know,  and  we  know  it  on  the  best  authority,  that  Shakespeare 
himself  wielded  a  very  facile  pen.  "  His  n  iid  and  hand,"  say 
the  editors  of  the  first  folio,  "went  together,  and  what  he 
thought  he  uttered  with  that  easiness  that  we  have  scarce 
received  from  him  a  blot  on  his  papers."  Milton  was  at  times 
distinguished  by  the  same  fluency,  and  when  the  fits  of  inspira- 
tion were  on  him,  his  amanuensis  could  scarcely  keep  up  with 
the  flood  of  verses  which  came  welling  forth.     In  Milton's  case 


142  THk  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

we  may  perhaps  $uspect  that  what  he  dictated  with  so  much 
ease  he  had  been  long  revolving,  ^nd  that  the  breathless  dicta- 
tion was  in  itself  an  effort  rather  of  memory  than  invention. 
"  Paradise  Lost"  has  all  the  appearance  of  being  a  highly  elabo- 
rated work.  Swift,  Steele,  and  De  Foe  were  all  of  them  remark- 
able for  their  rapidity  and  ease,  and  to  the  same  class  belong 
Fielding  and  Smollett.  Indeed,  Steele  and  Fielding  wrote  many . 
of  their  essays  while  the  press  was  waiting.  Johnson,  like  Gib- 
bon, wrote  at  first  with  labor,  but  afterwards  found  that,  with 
practice,  a  stately  and  highly  finished  style  came  as  naturally  as 
ordinary  expression  comes  to  ordinary  people,  We  leat'n,  for 
example,  that  some  of  the  best  papers  in  the  "Rambler"  were 
penned  as  easily  as  a  letter— that  forty-eight  octavo  pages  of 
the  "  Life  of  Savage,"  a  singularly  polished  work,  were  com- 
pleted at  a  sitting,  and  that  the  "  Lives  of  the  Poets"  cost  him 
no  more  trouble  than  a  slipshod  article  costs  a  professional 
journalist.  But  Johrson  was,  we  may  add,  indefatigable  in 
revising.  Ben  Jonson  tells  us  that  he  wrote  "  The  Alchymist  " 
in  six  weeks  ;  Fenelpn,  that  "  Telemaque"  was  produced  in  three 
months;  and  Brougham,  that  his  '*  Edinburgh  Review"  articles 
averaged  a  few  hours.  But  the  most  portentous  example  of 
literary  fecundity  on  record  is  beyond  question  to  be  found  in 
the  person  of  Lope  de  Vega.  He  thought  nothing  of  writing  a 
play  in  a  couple  of  days,  a  light  farce  in  an  hour  or  two,  and  in 
the  course  of  his  life  he  furnished  the  stage  of  Spain  with 
upwards  of  two  thousand  original  dramas.  Hallam  calculates 
that  this  extraordinary  man  was  the  author  of  at  least  twenty- 
one  million  three  hundred  thousand  lines.  The  most  volunii- 
nous  writer  in  modern  times — an  author  who  was,  in  facility  of 
composition,  not  far  inferior  to  Lope — would  certainly  be  Robert 
Southey,  whose  acknowledj^ed  jvorks  amount  to  no  less  than 
one  hundred  and  nine  volumes,  in  addition  to  whicli  he  con- 
tributed fifty-two  essays  to  the  "  Annual  Review,"  ninety- four  to 
the  "  Quarterly,"  and  to  minor  magazines  articles  without  num- 
ber.   After  Southey  would  come  Voltaire  aind  Sir  Walter  Scott. 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD,  143 

Sheridan  defined  easy  writing  to  be,  as  a  rule,  very  hard  reading. 
Some  of  the  great  men  to  whom  we  have  alluded  can  scarcely 
be  cited  in  support  of  the  observation,  though  in  reviewing  the 
work  thus  hurriedly  thrown  off,  there  is  one  circumstance  which 
must  strike  every  one.  If  we  except  Scott  (for  Shakespeare, 
whatever  may  have  been  his  facility  of  expression,  so  very  far 
from  being  a  voluminous  author,  has  indeed  all  the  marks  of  an 
exceptionally  conscientious  artist),  the  quality  of  the  work  pro- 
duced bears  no  relation  to  its  quantity.  Nine-tenths  of  Vol- 
taire's writing  is  now  known  only  to  the  curious.  Qryden  would 
have  stood  much  higher  than  he  does,  had  he  left  us  only  his 
four  or  five  best  poems.  Swift  is  remembered  principally  as  the 
author  of  "  Gulliver's  Travels,"  De  Foe  as  the  author  of  **  Rob- 
inson Crusoe,"  Bunyan  as  the  author  of  the  "  Pilgrim's  Prog- 
ress" only.  Steele,  in  spite  o£^ Mr.  Forster's  vindication,  lives 
chiefly  as  the  friend  of  Addison.  Southey's  fame  rests  on  his 
**  Lives  of  Nelson  and  Wesley,"  and  their  popularity  is  begin- 
ning to  decline.  Even  Scott's  giant  reputation,  if  not  exactly 
waning,  is  gradually  narrowing  itself  into  his  fame  as  a  story- 
teller. His  biographies  have  been  superseded.  His  essays  are 
seldom  read.  His  poetry  has  not  been  able  to  hold  its  own 
against  the  poetry  which  has  appeared  since  his  death.  His  his- 
torical works  have  already  been  consigned  to  oblivion.  Indeed 
the  whole  history  of  literature  goes  to  show  that  no  parts,  how- 
ever bright,  no  genius,  however  dazzling,  are  exempt  from  the 
curse  of  Adam. 

Let  us  now  look  at  the  method  of  authors  from  another  point 
of  view,  and  see  how  their  works  have  grown  up  under  their 
hand.  Godwin  wrote  "Caleb  Williams"  backward,  beginning 
on  principle  with  the  last  chapter  and  working  up  to  the  first. 
It  is  curious  to  note  how  many  poets  have  clothed  their 
thoughts  first  in  prose.  This,  Donatus  tells  us,  was  Virgil's 
custom.  The  original  form  which  the  "-^neid  "  took  was  a 
prose  narrative.  This  narrative  was  then  gradually  versifed, 
the  poet  writing  at  fim  fluehtly,  and  thea  laboriously  polishing 


144  ^  1^^^  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

his  lines  tijl  he  had  brought  them  as  near  perfection^  he  could. 
Thus  Goldsmith  worked  at  "  The  Traveler"  and  "The  Deserted 
Village."  Thus  Johnson. composed  •*  Irene,"  Butler  "  Hudibras," 
Boileau  his  "  Satires,"  Racine  and  Ben  Jonson  their  dramas, 
and  Pope  the  "  Essay  on  Man."  When  Balzac  was  engaged  on 
his  novels,  he  sent  off  the  skeleton  of  the  story  to  the  printers 
with  huge  interstices  for  the  introduction  of  conversations, 
descriptions,  and  the  like,  and  on  receiving  the  printed  sketch, 
shut  himself  up  in  his  room,  drank  nothing  but  water,  ate  noth- 
ing but  fruit  and  bread,  till  he  had  completed  the  work  by  filling 
up  the  blank  spaces.  Sou  they  usually  employed  himself  in 
passing  three  or  even  four  works  through  the  press  at  the  same 
time,  giving  each  its  allotted  space  in  the  twenty-four  hours. 
Richardson  produced  his  romances  by  pamfully  working  out 
different  portions  at  different  tinges,  sometimes  while  engaged  in  " 
his  shop,  sometimes  while  sitting  surrounded  by  friends  in  his 
snug  parlor  at  Hampstead.  Peter  Pindar's  method  was  to 
compose  the  poem  with  which  he  was  occupied,  first  of  all  in 
his  head  without  committing  a  word  of  it  to  paper,  and  then,  if 
his  amanuensis  was  away,  to  tear  a  sheet  of  paper  into  four 
quarters.  On  each  of  these  slips  he  inscribed  a  stanza  of  four 
or  six  lines  according  to  the  nature  of  the  poem.  The  paper 
thus  inscribed  he  placed  on  a  book  held  in  his  left  hand,  and 
thus,  in  spite  of  his  blindness,  contrived  to  write  not  only  legibly 
but  with  celerity  and  ease  as  well. 

It  hasalwasrs  been  my  practice  [says  Gibbon]  to  cast  a  long  para|^ph  in  a  single 
mold,  to  try  it  by  my  ear,  to  deposit  it  in  my  memory,  but  to  suspend  the  action  of 
the  pen  till  I  had  given  the  last  polish  to  my  w(M-k. 

Warburton,  Hurd,  Locke,  Parr,  and  Gibbon  always  read  with 
commonplace  books  in  front  of  them,  and  the  same  method  was 
adopted  also  by  Robert  Burton,  the  eccentric  author  of  the 
'"  Anatomy  of  Melancholy,"  by  the  great  scholars  Barthius  and 
Tumebus,  by  Thomas  Fuller,  the  quaintest  of  historians,  and  by 
Butler, .  the  author  of  ^'  Hudibr^/'    Casaubon  studied  with  slips 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD.  145 

of  paper  before  him,  on  which  he  jotted  down  catchwords,  the 
only  assistance  his  gigantic  memory  required.  Bentley,  the 
prince  of  Grecians,  took  care  to  buy  his  books  with  broad  mar- 
gins, and  on  these  margins  he  made  his  memoranda  Pope 
always  carried  a  note-book  with  him,  and  never  hesitated 
to  jot  down  anjrthing  which  struck  him  in  conversation. 
A  great  deal  of  his  "  Homer"  was  executed  in  bed  on  odd 
scraps  of  paper,  and  many  of  his  beautiful  couplets  were 
rounded  off  while  taking  the  air  in  his  bath-chair,  or  driv- 
ing in  his  little  chariot.  „  Prideaux's  great  wock  was  writ- 
ten to  while  away  the  time  while  the  author  was  recovering^ 
from  the  effects  of  an  agonizkig  operation.  Shelley  composed 
the  "  Revolt  of-  Islam"  while  lying  in  a  boat  on  the  Thames  at 
Marlow;  Keats,  his  "Ode  to  the  Nightingale"  in  a  lane  at 
Hampstead.  Almost  all  Wordsworth's  poetry  was  meditated  in 
the  open  air  an  1  committed  to  paper  on  his  return  home. 
Burns  composed  his  magnificent  lyric  "  Scots  wha'  ha  wi'  Wal- 
lace bled  "  while  galloping  on  horseback  over  a  wild  moor  in 
Scotland,  and  '*  Tam  O'Shanter"  in  the  woods  overhanging  the 
Doon.  Much  of  Bloomfield's  "  Farmer's  Boy"  was  fashioned 
while  its  author  was  engaged  in  his  trade  of  shoe-maker,  some 
of  the  verses  being  scratched  on  leather  whh  an  awl.  Wash- 
ington Irving's  favorite  studio  was  a  stile  in  some  pleasant 
meadow,  where  with  his  portfolio  on  his  knees  he  used  to 
mold  his  graceful  periods.  The  "  History  of  Thucyd ides"  was, 
if  we  are  to  believe  Marcellinus,  composed  under  a  plane-tree  in 
his  garden.  The  greater  part  of  Arnold's  "  Roman  History" 
was  written  in  his  drawing-room  with  his  children  playing  about 
him,  and  lively  conversation,  in  which  he  frequently  joined, 
going  on  round  the  table  on  which  his  manuscript  rested. 
Priestley  and  Beddoes  were  fond  of  writing  under  similar  cir- 
cumstances. What  would  to  nine  men  out  of  ten  be  an  intol- 
erable distraction,  was  to  them  a  gentle  and  welcome  stimulus. 
Johnson's  **  Vanity  of  Human  Wishes"  was  composed  as  he 
trudged  backwards  and  forwards  from  Hampstead>  and  Tom 


1^6  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Paine  usually  clothed  his  thoughts  in  expression  while  walking 
rapidly  in  the  sjtreets.  Hooker  often  meditated  the  '*  Ecclesias- 
tical Polity'*  when  rcfcking  the  cradle  of  his  child,  and  Spinoza 
his  "  Tractatus"  while  grinding  glasses.  Robert  Stephens 
thought  out  many  of  his  works  on  horseback.  Some  of  Field- 
ing's comedies  were  scrawled  in  taverns.  Descartes,  Berni  the 
Italian  poet,  and  Boyse,  the  author  of  the  once  celebrated 
"  Deity,"  usually  wrote  while  lying  in  bed.  Byron  tells  us  that 
he  composed  the  greater  part  of  '*  Lara"  at  the  toilet-taWe,  and 
the  prologue  on  the  opening  of  Drury  Lane  Theater  in  a  stage- 
coach. A  great  part  of  the  best  poem  Savage  ever  penned, 
"The  Wanderer,"  was  executed  piecemeal  on  scraps  of  pmper 
which  he  picked  up  casually  in  coi!ee-houses  or  in  the  streets, 
an^  in  the  same  miserable  way  poor  Gerald  Griffin  composed 
**  Gisippus.*'  Under  circumstances  still  less  favorable  the  Span- 
ish poet  Ercilkt  completed  the  first  part  of  the  "  Araucana."  In 
the  midst  of  a  savage  wilderness  surrounded  by  hostile  barba- 
rians and  under  the  naked  canopy  of  heaven,  he  inscribed  on 
small  shreds  of  waste  paper  the  fifteen  cantos  of  his  famous 
epic.  Among  all  the  distractions  of  the  events  they  describe, 
Caesar  committed  to  paper  the  immortal  "Commentaries." 
Moore's  splendid  Eastern  romance,  "  Lallah  Rookhr"  ^^'as  writ- 
ten in  a  cottage  blocked  up  by  snow,  with  an  English. winter 
howling  round.  Tasso  indited  some  of  his  loveliest  sonnets  on 
the  walls  of  the  cell  in  which  he  was  confined  as  a  lunatic ;  and 
Christopher  Smart  his  "Song  to  the  Deity,"  one  of  the  best 
sacred  lyrics  we  have,  in  a  madhouse. 

It  is  a  great  testimony  to  the  innate  power  of  genius— to  its 
capacity  for  triumphing  over  all  obstacles — that  some  of  its 
most  laborious  literary  undertakings  have  been  prosecuted  un- 
der the  most  unfavorable  conditions.  It  was  in  the  midst  of 
laborious  political  duties  that  Nieburh  carried  on  his  historical 
labors.  In  the  intervals  of  a  busy  mercantile  life  Roscoe  pro- 
duced his"  Histories  of  Lorenzo  de  Medici  and  Leo  X."  It  was 
«n  the  midst  of  a  restless  and  feverish  life  that  Scaliger,  6u- 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD.  147 

-chanan,  Erasmus/ Robert  Stephens,  and  Heinsius  accomplished 
their  gigantic  tasks.  Not  only  were  Homer  and  Milton  blind, 
but  the  same  affliction  had  overtaken  Prescott  when  he  produced 
his  various  historical  works,  Vhierry  when  he  composed  his 
"  History  of  the  Conquest  of  England  by  the  Normans,"  and 
Isaac  D'Israeli  when  he^ compiled  his  "Amenities  of  Litera- 
ture," and  to  this  list  must  be  added  Blind  Harry,  the  earliest  of 
Scotland's  epic  poets,  Blacklock,  and  our  own  Dr.  Walcot. 
Half-famished  in  a  miseraole  garret,  Heyne  gave  the  world  his 
edition  of  "  Tibullus."  Every  one  knows  how  the  immortal 
poem  of  Dante  was  formulated  as  he  wandered  a  needy  exile  from 
one  place  of  refuge  to  another,  how  the  "  Pilgrim's  Progress" 
was  indited  in  Bedford  jail,  and  "  Don  Quixote"  in  a  wretched 
prison  in  Spain.  But  these  great  works  are  far  from  exhaust- 
ing the  literature  which  has  emanated  from  the  dungeon.  We 
must  add  to  the  melancholy  catalogue  "The  Kynge's  Quhair" 
— one  of  the  best  poems  which  British  poetry  can  boast  between 
the  death  of  Chaucer  and  the  accession  of  Henry  VIH.,  penned 
by  James  I.  while  a  captive  in  Windsor  Castle ;  some  of  the 
most  pleasing  of  Lord  Surrey's  poems.  Sir  Walter  Raleigh's 
*'  History  of  the  World,"  Robert  Southwell's  "  Peter's  Com- 
plaint," Buchanan's  Latin  Version  of  the  Psalms,  Boethius's 
"  Consolation  of  Philosophy,"  Fleta,  De  Foe's  "  Review,"  Vol- 
taire's "  Henriade,"  Howel's  "  Familiar  Letters,"  much  of  Dave- 
nant's  "  Gondibert,"  Dodd's  "  Prison  Thoughts,"  Grotius's 
*' Commentary  on  St.  Matthew,"  Coombe's  "  Adventures  of  Dr. 
Syntax,"  Thomas  Cooper's  "Purgatory  of  Suicides,"  and  the 
list  might  be  extended  even  further.  Many  too  are  the  works 
produced  while  their  authors  were  in  exile.  It  was  in  exile 
that  Thucyd ides  composed  his  "History  of  the  Peloponnesian 
War,"  Xenophon  his  "  Anabasis,"  Ovid  his  "  Tristia,"  Clarendon 
his  "  History  of  the  Rebellion,"  Fortescue  his  "  De  Laudibus 
Legum  Anglise,"  Locke  his  famous  "  Letter  Concerning  Tolera- 
tion," Bolingbroke  his  still  more  famous  "  Letter  to  Sir  William 
Wyn^ham"  an4  his  "  Keflections  on  Exile."    That  misforti-   ' 


148  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

should  stimulate  genius  is  not  surprising,  but  that  sleep  should 
possess  creative  power  is  curious  indeed.  And  yet  Burns  tells 
us  that  he  dreamed  one  of  his  poems — it  may  be  found  in  his 
works — and  that  he  wrote  it  down  just  as  he'd  reamed  it.  Yol- 
taire  informed  his  friend  Wagniere  that  the  whole  of  the  second 
canto  of  the  "  Henriade"  was  composed  by  him  in  his  sleep. 
Coleridge  always  said  that  he  dreamed  "  Tubla  iChan,"  and 
Campbell  that  he  was  indebted  to  the  same  source  for  the  best 
line  in  "  Lochiel's  Warning."  Dion  Cassius  solemnly  assures 
us  that  he  undertook  his  history  solely  in  consequence  of  a  vis- 
ion in  his  sleep;  iEschylus,  as  Pausanias  tells  us,  was  wade  a 
poet  by  a  dream  ;  so  also  was  Caedmon ;  and  Tartini,  as  every 
one  knows,  dreamed  the  "  Devil's  Sonata." 

But  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  inducements  to  literary 
activity  is  that  recorded,  by  Captain  Bell,  the  translator  of 
Luther's  "  Table  Talk,"  whose  task  was  imposed  on  him  by  a 
ghost,  and  a  very  importunate  ghost  too.  We  will  give  the 
story  in  the  good  captain's  own  words.  After  alluding  to  the 
discovery  of  Luther's  work,  which  had  for  many  years  been  lost, 
he  goes  on  to  say  that  a  friend  had  told  him  he  would  bestow  a 
great  and  substantial  service  by  translating  it  into  English.  He 
accordingly  began  it,  but  after  a  while,  tiring  of  his  task,  laid  it 
aside. 

Then  about  six  weeks  after  I  had  received  the  said  book,  it  fell  out  that  being  in 
bed  with  my  wife  one  night  between  twelve  and  one  of  the  clock,  she  being  asleep, 
but  myself  yet  awake,  there  appeared  unto  me  an  ancient  man,  standing  at  my  bed- 
side, arrayed  all  in  white,  having  a  long  and  broad  white  beard  hanging  down  to 
his  girdle,  who,  taking  me  by  my  right  ear,  spake  these  words  following  unto  me: 
**  Sirrah !  will  not  you  take  time  to  translate  that  book  which  is  sent  unto  you  out  of 
Germany  ?  I  will  shortly  provide  for  you  both  place  and  time  to  do  it,"  and  then 
he  vanished  away  out  of  my  sight. 

-The  whole  strange  story  may  be  read  at  length  in  Captain 
Henry  Bell's  narrative,  which  is  prefixed  to  Hazlitt's  version  of 
the  "  Table  Talk."  Rotru,  the  French  dramatist,  used  to  say 
that  a  demon  frequently  seized  his  pen,  and  that,  helpless  in  the 

ip's  hands,  he  let  his  pen  drive  on  as  his  supernatural  visitant 


GENIUS  AND  METHOD.  I49 

guided — ^which   reminds  us,  by  the  way,  of  the  well-known 
remark  of  Moliere,  made  about  Corneille. 

Not  less  strange  have  been  the  habits  and  fancies  of  authors. 
Cameades,  the  philosopher,  seldom  wrote  without  dosing  him- 
self with  hellebore,  -^schylus,  Eupolis,  Cratinus.  and  Ennius  are 
said  never  to  have  sat  down  to  compose  till  they  were  intoxicated. 
Dry  den  often  had  himself  bled,  and,  like  Fuseli.  ate  raw  meat  to 
assist,  so  he  said,  his  imagination.  Shad  well,  De  Quincey, 
Psalmanaazar,  Dean  Milner,  Coleridge,  and  Bishop  Horsley 
stimulated  themselves  with  opium,  as  De  Musset  was  helpless 
without  absinthe.  Gray  seldom  sat  down  to  compose  without 
first  reading  through  some  cantos  of  the  "  Faery  Queen." 
Corneille  fired  himself  with  the  perusal  of  "Lucan.'*  Black- 
stcJne  never  wrote  without  a  bottle  of  port  wine  on  his  desk,  nor 
Schiller  without  a  flask  of  Rhenish  within  call.  When  his  im- 
agination was  sluggish  he  would  sit  with  his  feet  in  hot  water, 
drinking  coffee  "to  thaw  the  frost  on  his  wits."  Montaigne 
was  never  happy  without  his  cat,  and  with  the  pen  in  his  right 
hand  while  his  left  was  smoothing  the  glossy  back  of  his  favor- 
ite tabby,  meditated  his  "  Essays."  Boxhome,  the  great  Dutch 
scholar,  could  never  write  a  word  without  a  pipe  in  his  mouth, 
and  as  he  preferred  a  long  pipe  and  yet  required  the  use  of  both 
hands,  he  bethought  him  of  a  very  ingenious  device.  He  had  a 
hat  with  an  enormous  brim,  which  impended  in  front  of  his 
face;  through  this  he  made  a  hole  to  support  his  pipe,  thus 
securing  the  double  advantage  of  shading  his  eyes  and  enjoying 
without  inconvenience  his  favorite  luxury,  and  in  this  way  he 
produced  his  voluminous  and  valuable  writings.  Hobbes  had 
the  same  weakness,  "  ten  or  twelve  pipes  with  a  candle"  being 
his  invariable  concomitants  at  the  desk,  and  Dr.  Parr  was  not 
less  dependent  on  tobacco.  Southey  could  never  write  a  line 
except  at  his  desk,  with  his  books  round  him  and  with  familiar 
objects  by.  Milton  could,  he  said,  never  compose  anything  to 
his  satisfaction  except  between  the  vernal  and  autumnal  equi- 
nox.    At  those  seasons  his  poetry  came  like  an  inspiration.    At 


ISO-  V   THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Other  times,  in  spite  of  the  most  strenuous  efforts,  he  would  bi*^ 
unable  to  bring  to  the  birth  a  single  verse.  Thomson,  Collins, 
and  Gray  had  the  same  superstition  about  themselves.  John- 
son, with  his  usual  bluff  common-sense,  ridicules  such  fancies, 
and  calls  them  unworthy  of  any  sensible  man — the  good  Doc- 
tor's theory  being  that  a  man.  who  had  the  power  of  writings 
always  could  write  "  if  he  set  himself  doggedly  to  it."  Crabbers 
fancies  about  himself  are  so  curious  that  we.  will  quote  the  pas- 
sage in  his  son's  biography  of  him  which  bears  on  the  subject: 

He  fancied  that  autumn  was  on  the  whole  the  most  favorable  season  for  him  ia 
the  composition  of  poetry,  but  there  was  something  in  the  effect  of  a  sudden  fall  of 
snow  that  appeared  to  stimulate  him  in  a  very  extraordinary  manner.  It  was  dur- 
ing a  great  snowstorm  that,  shut  up  in  his  room,  he  wrote  almost  currcnte  cakmt> 
his  ''  Sir  Eustace  Grey."  Latterly  he  worked  chiefly  at  night  after  all  the  family  had 
retired. 

Even  a  robust  and  practical  scholar  like  Bishop  Warburton 
tells  us  that  he  could  only  write  "  in  a  hand-to-mouth  style," 
and  that  the  blowing  of  an  east  wind,  a  fit  of  the  spleen,  or  the 
fact  that  he  had  not  his  books  round  him,  cofnpletely  destroyed 
bis  power  of  composition.  George  Wither  the  poet  was  obliged 
to  watch  and  fast  when  he  was  engaged  in  making  verses;  his 
spirit  he  says  was  lost  if  at  such  times  he  tasted  meat  and  drink ; 
"  even,"  he  adds,  "  if  I  take  a  glass  of  wine  I  cannot  write  a 
line." 

Sir  Henry  Wotton  gives  a  curious  account  of  Father  Sarpi— 
Macaulay's  favorite  historian,  and  t}ie  author  of  the  famous 
"  History  of  the  Council  of  Trent" : 

His  manner  was  to  sit  fenced  with  a  castle  of  paper  about  his  chair  and  above  his 
head,  for  he  was  of  our  Lord  of  St.  Albans*  opinion,  that  air  is  predatory,  and  espe- 
cially hurtful  when  the  spirits  are  most  enlarged. 

William  Prynne,  the  voluminous  author  of  the  "  Histrionras- 
trix,"  was  nothing  "  without  a  long  quilted  cap  which  came  an 
inch  over  his  eyes."  Buffon  was  helpless  without  a  spotless 
shirt  and  a  starched  frill.  Still  stranger  were  the  whims  of 
Graham,  the  author  of  "  The  Sabbath,"  and  Hogg,  the  Ertrick 


WHO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS'*f  IS^ 

Shepherd,  who,  if  we  are  to  believe  De  Quincey.  found  their 
vein  never  ran  happily  unless  they  sat  down  to  their  tasks  with 
boots  and  spurs  on.  An  eminent  modern  novelist  finds  his  pen 
and  his  imagination  powerless  unless  he  sits  surrounded  by 
lighted  candles  in  a  darkened  room,  and  Horace  Walpole  tells 
us  that  Lord  Orrery  found  no  stimulus  so  efficacious  as  a  sharp 
fit  of  the  gout.  The  great  Dutch  scholar,  Isaak  Vossius,  and  our 
own  poet,  John  Philipps,  would  employ  a  servant  to  comb  their 
hiir  whilst  they  meditated  their  works.  Coleridge  told  Hazlitt 
that  when  engaged  in  composition  he  never  found  his  vein  so 
happy  as  when  he  was  walking  over  uneven  ground,  or  making 
his  way  through  a  coppice  with  the  twigs  brushing  his  face. 
Wordsworth  on  the  other  hand  preferred  a  straight  gravel  walk 
where  he  could  wander  mechanically  and  without  any  impedi- 
ment to  and  fro;  in  this  way  almost  all  his  later  poems  were 
composed.  Lord  Bacon  had  a  fancy  for  inhaling  the  fumes  of  a 
bottle  of  claret  poured  out  on  earth  which  had  been  newly  up- 
turned. But  here  we  must  conclude,  though  we  have  by  no 
means  exhausted  our  list  of  the  whims  and  oddities  of  the 
strange  race  to  whom  the  world  owes  so  much. 

Templi  Bar. 


WHO  WROTE  "GIL  BLAS"? 

Le  Sage's  novel,  "  Gil  Bias  of  Santillana,"  enjoys  a  world-wide 
reputation.  It  is  a  vivid  picture  of  manners,  an  apotheosis  "of 
the  indifferent  worldling  to  whom  neither  virtue  nor  roguery  is 
in  itself  commendable  or  hateful,  but  to  whom  the  pursuit  of 
happiness,  and  success  in  that  pursuit,  constitute  the  aim  and 
end  of  existence.  The  book,  it  has  been  shrewdly  said,  is  as 
moral  as  experience :  it  is  also  as  useful ;  and  hence  the  cause  of 
its  popularity.    Besides,  Le  Sage  possesses  in  the  highest  de- 


152  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

gree  the  art  of  describing,  in  a  fresh,  pure,  and  simple  style,  that 
which  is  not  pure,  and  of  touching  the  evils  of  his  time  lightly, 
but  always  on  the  weak  spot.  Gil  Bias  tells  his  own  story,  and 
relates  his  illusions,  his  struggles,  his  failures  and  successes  with 
unimpaired  cheerfulness  and  good-humored  philosophy.  He 
dilates  and  reflects  on  all  he  sees,  and  on  the  whole  exercises  * 
his  wit  as  well  on  his  own  history  as  on  the  actions  of  the  soci- 
ety in  which  he  lives.  All  that  he  narrates  is  simple  and  drawn 
from  the  life;  and  yet  there  is  hardly  a  minor  fcaiurc  of  the  pic- 
ture which  does  not  aim  both  at  satirizing  and  finding  excuses 
for  the  foibles  of  mankind.  Gil  Bias  spares  nothing  and  no- 
body, and  even  his  own  shortcomings  are  exposed  with  spark- 
ling drollery  and  vengeful  frankness,  though  he  gives  himself 
credit — and  to  others  as  well  — for  the  upwellings  of  a  better  na- 
ture. He  is  a  true  type  of  men  kindly  disposed  and  not  evil- 
intentioned,  but  withal  weak  in  the  flesh  and  unable  always  to 
resist  temptation,  even  whilst  he  knows  that  he  will  repent  of  it 
afterwards. 

It  has  been  said  that  Le  Sage,  in  his  one-act  farce,  "  Le  Tem- 
ple de  Memoire,"  represented  at  the  Fair  St.  Laurent  in  1725, 
and  afterwards  at  the  theater  of  the  Palais  Royal,  ridiculed  the 
exaggerated  admiration  for  Voltaire — ^then  only  known  by  the 
tragedies  of  "CEdipe,"  "Artemire,"  and  **Mariamne,"  and 
through  his  poem  of  "  La  Ligue,"  a  feeble  and  first  sketch  of  the 
*'  Henriade" — by  making  a  poet  who  wishes  to  reach  the  Temple 
of  Memory  pick  up  a  book  from  the  ground  whilst  saying,  "  Je 
prends  mon  vol  terre  a  terre."  Le  Sage's  farce,  interspersed 
with  songs,  opens  with  the  appearance  of  Folly  and  Pierrot. 
F©lly  bewails  the  misfortune  that  so  many  men  are  anxious  to 
flirt  with  her,  but  that  none  seems  to  wish  to  marry  her;  where- 
upon her  confidant  advises  her  to  adopt  the  name  of  Glory,  and 
to  promise  a  perennial  name  in  history  to  him  who  will  niake 
her  his  wife,  for  "  poets  are  not  the  only  persons  who  love  to  be 
mache-lauriers  and  amateurs  de  fumee."  Fame  approves  of  this 
advice ;  Folly  thereupon  shakes  her  bauble,  ai;d,  as  if  by  magic, 


WHO  WROTE  **GIL  BLAS''?  IS3 

the  Temple  of  Memory  arises  on  the  top  of  a  steep  hill.  Various 
suitors  for  her  hand  now  come  upon  the  stage.  First,  a  con- 
queror, whose  only  delight  is  fighting,  bullets,  pistols  and  knives, 
and  who  declares  it  as  his  opinion  that  "any  one  at  the  head  of 
a  goodly  number  of  cavalry,  infantry,  and  artillery  has  a  right  to 
another  man's  property."  Then  a  rich  miller  makes  her  a  pro- 
posal. Next  an  artist  asks  for  her  hand,  who  is  dressed  as  a 
harlequin,  professes  to  be  a  good  fellow,  promises  to  be  very 
uxorial,  and  shows  Folly  how  to  borrow  different  colors  from 
his  variegated  coat.  Folly,  under  the  disguise  of  Glory,  recom- 
mends him  to  marry  a  rich  woman,  and  not  to  sue  for  her  hand, 
for  he  will  have  a  fair  chance  of  dying  on  a  dunghill  unless  he 
acts  up  to  her  recommendation.  But  the  artist  replies  that  he 
will  be  happy  to  live  with  her  on  such  a  malodorous  spot,  where- 
upon Folly,  carried  away  by  enthusiasm,  exclaims,  "  Vivent  les 
Gueux !"  an  exclamation  which  the  great  French  song-writer, 
Beranger,  utilized,  about  ninety  years  later,  as  the  last  line  of  the 
burden  of  his  song,  "  Les  Gueux."  M.  Tout-Uni,  or  Mr.  Quite- 
Smooth,  a  poet,  now  appears,  and  is  anxious  to  obtain  the  hand 
of  Glory,  but  is  rebuked  for  his  presumption  by  M.  Pr6ne-Vers, 
ExtoUerof  Verses — by  whom  it  is  said  Voltaire's  friend  Thi6riot 
was  meant — who  sues  her  in  the  name  of  that  "  Phoenix  of 
poets,"  his  "  illustrissime"  friend,  the  "  c616brissime"  author  of 
an  *'el6gantissime"  poem,  "far  superior  to  all  poems  past,  pres- 
ent, and  future,  and  whose  praises  he  will  never  cease  to  sing." 
Folly  replies  that  she  knows  by  these  hyperbolic  epithets  what 
kind  of  Homer  is  meant.  Three  other  poets  arrive  as  fresh 
suitors :  but  Folly  now  appears  under  her  own  true  colors,  argues 
that  no  real  difference  exists  between  herself  and  Glory,  and 
expresses  her  willingness  to  marry  them  all.  Voltaire,  of  whose 
poem,  "  La  Ligue,"  Folly  had  already  said — 

Dans  ce  pofeme  si  vant^, 
L'art  se  trouve  un  peu  maltralU. 
Vous  arran^jrez  votre  matiiftt 
dans  (sic)  dessus  dessous, 


154  '^HE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Sans  devant  derrifere ; 

Et  les  bons  morceaiix  y  sont  tous 

Sans  devant  demure, 

Sans  desdus  dessous  * — 

may,  perhaps,  have  felt  still  more  bitterly  the  sting  of  a  couplet, 
also  sun^  by  Folly,  and  referring  to  his  tragedy,  **  CEdipus/' 
written  when  he  was  cnly  eighteen  years  old,  performed  in  171 8 
forty-five  times  in  succession,  and  published  the  following 
year  with  some  letters  to  a  friend,  in  which  are  analyzed  the 
•"  CEdipus"  of  Sophocles,  a  tragedy  of  the  same  name  by  Cor- 
neille,  and  his  own.  The  lines  sung  by  Folly  in  the  fifteenth 
and  last  scene  of  the  "  Temple  de  Memoire"  are  as  follows : 

Un  sQJet  traits  par  ComeiUe 
N'avait  qu'ua  prix  tr^-incertaia ; 
Mais  il  devient  une  merveille. 
En  nous  passant  de  main  en  main ! 
Ha !  YRument  voire ! 
Ziste,  zeste  et  lonla, 
En  grand  trio  te  voili, 
Dans  le  Temple  de  M^moire. 

Le  Sage  renewed  his  attack  on  the  poet  ten  years  later.  In  the 
last  volume  of  '*  Gil  Bias,"  which  appeared  in  1735,  there  is  a 
portrait  of  Don  Gabriel  Triaquero,  a  fashionable  playwright  (bk. 
X.  ch.  5),  whom  everybody  runs  to  see,  for  no  better  reason  than 
that  he  is  fashionable,  and  which,  it  was  generally  believed,  was 
intended  for  Voltaire.  When,  in  1752,  five  years  after  Le  Sage's 
death,  the  "  Age  of  Louis  XIV."  was  published,  the  then  cele- 
brated Voltaire  saw  his  way  to  pay  off  a  literary  grudge,  and 
could  not  resist  the  temptation.  He  says  in  this  wcrk:  "vGil 
Bias '  is  still  read  because  it  is  true  to  nature ;  but  it  s  entirely 
taken  from  the  Spanish  romance  called  *La  Vidad  de  lo  Escu- 
diero  Dom  Marcos  d'Obrego.'  "  t    This  criticism  of  Voltaire  was 

*  These  words  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  sixth  volume  of  the  "  Theatre  dc  la 
Foire,"  Amsterdam,  Zacharie  Ch4telain,  1731,  in  which  volume  "Le  Temple  vc 
M^moire  *'  is  published. 

t  Ticknor,  in  his  *'  History  of  Spanish  Liberaturstt*'  V9I.  iU.»  p.  3,  ch.  34,  observes: 


WJIO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS"r  155 

soon  followed  by  others.  1  he  very  trouble  Le  Sage  had  taken 
to  render  his  novel  perfect,  the  pains  he  had  bestowed  to  become 
intimately  acquainted  with  the  habits  and  customs  of  the  Span- 
iards of  the  times  he  describes,  served  as  a  reason  for  attacking 
him  and  his  book,  and  for  accusing  him  of  impudent  plagiarism. 
Father  Juan  d*Isla,  a  well-known  Sp  nish  author,  stigmatized 
Le  Sage  as  having  stolen  "  Gil  Bias"  from  a  manuscript  which 
an  unknown  Andalusian  advocate  had  given  to  the  Frenchman 
whilst  in  Spain.  The  padre  had  his  own  Spanish  translation  of 
the  French  novel  printed  and  published  in  Madrid  in  1787, 
omitting  some  parts  and  altering  others,  adding  to  it  a  long  and 
not  successful  continuation,  and  stating  on  the  title-page  that 
"  Gil  Bias"  was  "  now  restored  to  its  country  and  native  language 
by  a  Spaniard  who  does  not  choose  to  have  his  nation  trifled 
with."  But  nobody  believed  in  the  Spanish  advocate  and  in  the 
manuscript  given  to  Le  Sage  in  Sp^in,  for  he  had  never  been 
there.  In  181 8  Count  Francois  de  Neufchateau  read  a  disserta- 
tion before  the  French  Academy,  in  which  he  tried  to  show  that 
Le  Sage  was  the  author  of  "  Gil  Bias,"  and  this  dissertation  he 
enlarged,  improved,  and  published  in  1820,  as  a  preface  to  an 
edition  of  this  novel.*  The  same  year,  a  learned  Spanish  exile, 
Don  Juan  Antonio  Llorente,  who  was  then  living  in  Paris,  and 
who  had  just  published  a  "  History  of  the  Inquisition  in  Spain," 
presented  to  the  French  Academy  a  Memoir  of  Critical  Obser- 
vations, in  which  he  attempted  to  establish  that  "Gil  Bias"  had 
not  been  written  by  Le  Sage,  but  by  a  Spaniard.    This  Memoir 

•*  The  idea  that  the  '  Gil  Bias*  was  taken  entirely  from  the  '  Marcos  de  Obregfon'  of 
Espinel.  or  was  very  seriously  indebted  to  that  work,  is  as  absurd  as  Voltaire's  mode 
of  speliin°^  the  title  of  the  book,  which  evidently  he  had  never  seen,  and  of  which 
he  could  even  have  heard  very  little." 

*  This  dissertation  was  really  written  by  Victor  Hugfo,  then  a  very  youngf  man. 
This  is  partly  hinted  at  by  the  words  Marius  uses  in  the  "  Mis^rables":  "She  (Co- 
sette)  would  not  fail  to  esteem  and  value  me  if  she  knew  that  I  am  the  real  author  of 
the  dissertation  on  Marcos  Obregon  de  la  Ronda,  which  M.  Franfois  de  Neufch^ 
teau  appropriated,  and  used  as  a  preface  to  hiS  edition  of  ^  Gil  Bias; ' "  and  is  abso- 
lutely confirmed  m  a  chapter  of  ''  Victor  Hugo  racont^  parim  Xiimok^  4e  sa  vie," a 
work  said  to  be  wi;iuea  by  Madame  Hugo. 


156  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

was  forwarded  to  a,  committee,  composed  of  MM.  de  Neufchi.- 
teau.  Raynouard,  and  Lemontey ;  but  no  report  seems  ever  to 
have  been  made.  Eighteen  months  after  the  presentation  cf 
Llorente's  Memoir,  the  first  of  these  gentlemen  read  to  the 
Academy  an  "  Examen  du  nouveau  systeme  sur  I'auteur  de  *  Gil 
Bias,'  ou  reponse  aux  Observations  critiques  de  M.  Llorente," 
which  was  published  the  same  year.  This  was  shortly  after-  J 
wards  replied  to  by  M.  Llorente,  who  amplified  and  sent  forth, 
in  the  form  of  a  book,  his  "  Observations  critiques  sur  le  Ro- 
man de  '  Gil  Bias  de  Santillane,' "  in  which  he  maintains  that 
this  novel  was  the  work  of  the  Spanish  historian  de  Solis.  chiefly 
because  no  one  but  this  gentleman  could  have  planned  such  a 
fiction  at  the  time  "  Gil  Bias"  is  supposed  to  have  been  written. 
Llorente's  book  is  di»rided  into  fourteen  chapters,  of  which  the 
first  and  twelfth  contain  the  pretended  history  of  the  manu- 
script, whilst  the  other  ten  attempt  to  prove  its  existence.  The 
second  chapter  is  called  "  A  Chronology  of  the  Life  of  Gil  Bias," 
and  gives  the  days  and  the  months  when  certain  events  of  the 
novel  are  supposed  to  have  happened.  According  to  this  chap- 
ter, Gil  Bias,  born  in  1588,  was  about  thirty-two  or  thirty-three 
years  old  when  Philip  III.  died,  and  was  fifty-eight  or  fifty-nine 
when  he  married  for  the  second  time,  in  1646. 

In  the  North  American  Review  for  October,  1827,  appeared 
an  article  "  Who  wrote  *  Gil  Bias '  ?"  of  which  the  author,  Mr.  A. 
H.  Everett,  inclines  to  the  belief  that  de  Solis,  and  not  Le  Sage, 
was  the  author  of  "Gil  Bias."  He  bases  his  opinion  chiefly  on 
Llorente's  "  Observations."  and  states  frankly  that  he  has  not 
seen  the  "  Examen"  pf  the  Count  de  Neufchateau,  in  defense  of 
that  novel,  but  has  derived  the  latter's  reasons  from  the  work  of 
Llorente.  Mr.  Everett's  arguments  in  favor  of  a  Spanish  origin 
of  "  Gil  Bias"  are : 

I®.  The  minute  acquaintance  of  the  author  with  the  political, 
geographical,  and  statistical  situation  of  Spain,  ^nd  with  the 
manners  of  itg  inhabitants. 

2'.  The  considerable  number  of  errors*  more  or  less  obvious. 


WHO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS" r  ^         157 

principally  in  the  manner  of  writing  the  names  of  places  and 
persons,  and  most  naturally  accounted  for  by  considering  them 
as  the  errors  of  a  person  transcribing  names  with  which  he  was 
not  perfectly  familiar. 

3®.  The  mixture  of  Spanish  idioms,  and  even  Spanish  words 
^  and  phrases,  to  be  found  in  "  Gil  Bias." 

4<».  The  illustrating  by  an  example  in  French,  "les  intermedes 
font  beaute  dans  une  comedie,"  the  verbal  niceties  of  the  style 
of  the  Spanish  poet,  Gongora. 

5*».  The  probability  of  Le  Sage  having  taken  "  Gil  Bias"  from 
the  same  source  as  "  The  Bachelor  of  Sala,manca,"  which  came 
out  in  1738  as  an  avowed  translation  from  an  unpublished  Span- 
ish manuscript. 

These  same  arguments,  amplified  and  worked  out,  as  well  as 
many  fresh  ones,  have  been  used  in  an  article  also  called  "  Who 
wrote  *Gil  Bias'?"  which  appeared  in  the  June  number  of 
Blackwood's  Magazine  for  1844,  and  in  which  are  ably  main- 
tained the  views  of  those  who  persist  in  believing  that  "  Gil 
Bias"  is  of  Spanish  origin.  Following  chiefly  Llorente.  the 
writer  of  this  article  states  that  "Gil  Bias"  is  translated  from  a 
manuscript  written  in  Spanish  by  Don  Antonio  de  Solis  y  Riba- 
deneira,  author  of  "  Historia  de  la  Conquista  de  Mejico."  The 
reasons  given  for  this  assertion  are :  i*,  that  this  novel  abounds 
in  facts  and  allusions  which  none  but  a  Spaniard  could  know ; 
and,  2*,  that  it  abounds  in  errors  which  no  Spaniard  could 
make. 

It  is  further  stated  that  Le  Sage  obtained  the  manuscript  from 
the  library  of  his  friend  and  patron,  the  Abbe  de  Lyonne,  third 
son  of  Hugo,  Marquis  de  Lyonne,  a  lover  of  Spanish  literature, 
who  was  sent  on  a  secret  mission  to  Spain  in  1656  (1658),  and 
who,  whilst  there,  lived  in  great  intimacy  with  Louis  de  Haro, 
Duke  of  Montoro.  As  an  additional  argfument,  it  is  mentioned 
,  that "  The  Bachelor  of  Salamanca,"  published  in  1738,  which  the 
author  himself  admitted  to  be  a  translation  from  a  Spanish 
manuscript,  and  of  which  he  never  produced  the  original,  bears 


IS8  ~THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,  ~  ^i 

a  great  similarity  to  "  Gil  Bias,"  and  contains  part  of  that  nranti- 
script  relating  to  America,  and  not  found  in  the  last-mentioned 
work  of  Le  Sage.  Nineteen  points  of  resemblance  are  brought 
forward  to  prove  this.  It  is  also  argued  that  the  frequent  allu- 
sions in  "  Gil  Bias"  to  some  of  the  most  remarkable  characters 
of  the  court  of  Louis  XIV.  only  demonstrate  "  that  the  extremes 
of  society  are  very  uniform  .  .  .  and  the  abuses  of  govern- 
ment   .    .     .     the  same,  or  nearly  so,  in  every  countn%" 

The  facts  and  allusions  which  none  but  a  Spaniard  could 
know  are  as  follows : 

1.  The  custom  of  traveling  on  mules,  the  coin  ducats,  the 
begging  with  a  rOsary  a$  well  as  the  extorting  money  in  the 
manner  which  Gil  Bias  delineates,  and  the  subterranean  caves 
described  by  Captain  Rolando. 

2.  The  words  "  dire  son  rosaire,  rezar  su  rosario,"  as  foreign 
to  the  habits  of  a  "  vierux  militaire ;"  traveling  the  whole  day 
without  meeting  any  one;  the  escorting  of  a  coach,  and  the 
drawing  of  that  vehicle  by  mules. 

3.  The  treatment  of  prisoners  in  Spain. 

-     4.  The  exact  description  of  the  class  of  women  known  in  Spain 
by  the  name  "  Beata." 

5.  The  dinner-hour  at  twelve  during  the  reigns  of  Philip  III. 
and  Philip  IV. 

6.  The  description  of  the  Spanish  innkeepers,  so  different 
from  the  French,  as  well  as  the  intimate  knowledge  displayed  by 
Gil  Bias  of  the  houses  of  noblemen  at  Madrid  (bk.  ii.  ch.  7,  and 
bk.  vii.  ch.  13). 

7.  The  acquaintance  with  Spanish  habits  and  customs,  as  Mer- 
gelina  putting  on  her  mantle  to  go  to  mass  (bk.  ii.  ch.  7);  Gil 
Bias  joining  the  muleteer  (bk.  iii.  ch.  i);  Rolando  informing 
Gil  Bias  that  his  comrades  were  three  days  in  prison  before  be- 
ing put  to  death  (bk.  iii.  ch.  2) ;  the  allusion  to  the  Andalusian 
way  of  managing  a  cloak  (bk.  iii.  ch.  5) ;  and  to  the  "  Caballeros 
en  Pla^a,"  or  amateur  gentlemen  bull-fighters  (bk.  iv.  ch.  7)  ; 
the  dress  of  the  inquisitor  aad  his  servants;  the  Inkstand  eftDed 


WffO   WROTE   '*GIL  BLAS**f  159 

•'Tintero  de  E^cribano,"  which  the  Spanish  scriveners  always 
carry  about  with  them,  as  well  as  the  whole  scene  between  Am- 
brosia de  Laraela  and  Simon  (bk.  vi.  ch.  i) ;  the  custom  of  carry- 
ing wine  in  leathern  bags  (bk.  ii.  ch.  6) ;  the  appointment  of  Ig- 
natio  to  the  archdeaconry  of  Granada,  by  virtue  of  a  particular 
bnll  (bk.  X.  ch.  12);  and  the  allusion  which  the  Count-Duke  of 
Olivarez  makes  to  Don  Alphonso  de  Leyva  about  the  objection 
of  the  Aragonese  to  be  governed  by  any  other  but  the  king  him- 
self, or  by  a  person  of  the  royal  blood  (bk.  xi.  ch.  12). 

8.  The  use  in  "  Gil  Bias"  of  "  Don"  prefixed  in  Spanish  to 
the  Christian,  and  never  to  the  surname,  as  Don  Juan,  whilst  its 
synonym  "  Dom"  is  in  France  prefixed  to  the  surname,  as  Dom 
Calmet;  ''dame"  as  a  translation  of  " sefiora,"  and  the  latter 
word  itself;  as  well  as  the  employment  of  many  other  Spanish 
expressions  and  idions,  such  as  sefior  escudero,  sefior  caballero, 
famosa  comedia,  hidalgo,  contador  mayor,  oidor,  escribano,  hos- 
pital de  nifios,  olla  podrida,  marmalada  de  berengaria,  picaro.  etc." 

9.  The  knowledge  that  during  the  reign  of  Philip  IV.  the 
actors  lodged  in  the  pwovince^  in  the  buildings  in  which  dra- 
matic performances  were  represented. 

10.  The  idiomatic  Spanish  verses  which  Don  Gaston  de  Co- 
gollos  sings  in  the  Tower  of  Segovia  (bk.  ix.  ch.  5). 

11.  The  words  which  Lg  Sage  has  evidently  translated  from 
the  Spanish,  such  as  "seigneur,  dame,  cavalier,"  as  well  as  many 
expressions  of  Spanish  origin,  such  as  "  a  Dieu  ne  plaise,  ils  sgnt 
tons  plus  durs  que  des  Juifs,  graces  au  ciel,  patriarche  des  Indes, 
gargon  de  famille,  benefice  simple,  gargon  de  bien  et  d'honneur, 
fameux  directeur,  laboureur,  disciple,  viceroi,  Juif  comme  Pilate, 
dormir  la  sieste.  rendre  de  tres- humbles  graces,  etc." 

12.  The  local  knowledge  of  Spanish  towns,  as  shown  by  Gil 
•Bias,  such  as  the  mentioning  of  a  church  at  Toledo  called  "de 
los  Reyes,"  the  speaking  of  the  Prado  of  Madrid  as  the  "  pre  de 
Sai:it-Jer6me,"  the  quoting  the  "  Rue  des  Infantes"  and  the 
"  Maison  des  Repenties"  in  the  same  town  ;  and  the  statement 
that  Lucretia,  the  repentant  mistress  of  Philip  IV.,  is  going  into 


I60  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

the  nunnery  of  "  la  Incamacion,"  reserved  expressly  for  nuns 
connected  in  some  way  with  the  royal  family  of  Spain.  To  this 
should  be  added  the  mentioning  of  no  less  than  seventy  prov- 
inces and  large  towns  in  Spain,  and  of  one  hundred  and  three 
Spanish  villages  and  towns  of  inferior  importance,  many  of  thenx 
unknown  out  of  that  country.  ^. 

13.  The  citing  of  the  names  of  thirteen  dukes  and  eight 
counts,  of  which  four  only  are  fictitious,  whilst  the  title  of  "Ad- 
mirante  de  Castilia,"  also  quoted,  did  not  exist  when  **  Gil  Bias" 
was  published ;  the  naming  of  about  sixty  persons  celebrated  in 
their  day  among  the  inhabitants  of  the  Peninsula,  belonging  to 
distinguished  families,  and  the  employment  of  twenty-nine 
names,  really  Spanish,  but  applied  to  imaginary  characters,  as 
well  as  forty-five  names  '*  intended  to  explain  the  character  of 
those  to  whom  they  are  given,  like  Mrs.  Slipslop  and  Parson 
Trulliber  in  English,  retained  by  Le  Sag«,  notwithstanding  the 
loss  of  their  original  signification." 

The  errors  which  no  Spaniard  would  make  are : 

1.  The  orthographical  mistal^s  which  abound  in  "Gil  Bias," 
and  which  prove  that  Le  Sage  transcribed  his  novel  from  a 
manuscript,  such  as  "CorCuelo"  instead  of  "  Corzuelo,"  "  Man- 
juelo"  for  •*  Majuelo,"  "  Londona"  for  "  Londoflo,"  "carochas" 
for  "  corozas,"  "  cantador"  for  **  contador,"  **  Segiar"  for  "  Se- 
guiar,"  "  Moyadas"  for  **  Miajadas,"  "  Priego"  for  "  Pliego." 

2.  Le  Sage's  ignorance  of  Spanish  etiquette  by  supposing  as 
equivalent  words  "  Sefior"  and  "  Sefioria,"  the  latter  title  being 
only  given  to  people  of  high  station  and  illustrious  rank. 

3.  The  anecdote  about  the  rector  of  the  University  of  Sala- 
manca being  found  in  the  streets  intoxicated  ;  which  does  not 
tally  with  Spanish  manners,  but  was  interpolated  by  Le  Sage. 

4.  The  many  errors  in  the  spelling  of  Spanish  places,  which  * 
go  far  to  prove  that  Le  Sage  did  not  copy  these  names  from 
printed  books. 

5.  The  historical  errors  to  be  found  in  "  Gil  Bias,"  and  of 
which  only  one,  which  occurs  in  the  history  of  Don  Pompcyo 


WHO  WROTE   ^'GIL  BIAS''?  l6l 

de  Castro  (bk,  iii.  ch.  7),  is  confessed  by  Le  Sage,  "though  the 
original  Spanish  author  may  have  fallen  into  some  of  them." 

6.  The  errors  of  Le  Sage  himself,  such  as  Donna  Mencia's  first 
husband  dying  in  the  service  of  the  King  of  Portugal,  ^v^  or 
six  years  after  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century;  "  Le 
Mariage  de  Vengeance"  (bk.  iv.  ch.  4),  which  did  not  take 
place,  as  described,  in  the  time  of  Philip  II.,  but  three  hundred 
years  before^  during  the  Sicilian  Vespers,  1283 ;  Gil  Bias,  after  his 
release  from  the  Tower  of  Segovia,  telling  his  patron,  Alphonso 
de  Leyva,  that  four  months  before  he  had  held  an  important 
office  under  the  Spanish  crown  (bk.  ix.  ch.  10),  while  he  states  to 
Philip  IV.  that  he  was  six  months  in  prison  at  Segovia  (bk.  xi. 
ch.  2)  ;  and,  above  all,  the  error  of  Scipio  (bk.  ^i.  ch.  i)  return- 
ing to  his  master  in  1621,  and  informing  him  that  Philip  III. 
had  died,  that  the  Cardinal  Duke  of  Lerma  had  lost  his  office, 
and  that  the  Count  of  Olivarez  was  appointed  prime  minister, 
whilst  in  reality  the  Duke  of  Lerma  had  been  dismissed  three 
years  before  the  death  of  the  king,  and  was  succeeded  by  his 
son,  the  Duke  of  Uzeda.  Hence  it  is  inferred  that  Le  Sage,  in 
transcribing  from  the  supposed  Spanish  manuscript,  left  out  the 
words  "the  Duke  of  Uzeda,  son  of,"  for  that  nobleman  was 
really  turned  out  of  office  at  the  death  of  Philip  III. 

Moreover,  the  reasons  given  why  Le  Sage  claims  to  be  the  au- 
thor of "  Gil  Bias,"  but  merely  the  translator  of  the  "  Bachelor  of 
Salamanca,"  are,  that  the  "  Bachelor"  "  had  been  long  in  the  pos- 
session of  the  Marquis  de  Lyonne  and  his  son  before  it  became 
the  property  of  Le  Sage ;  and,  although  tolerably  certain  that  it 
had  never  been  diligently  perused,  the  French  author  could  not 
be  sure  that  it  had  not  attracted  superficial  notice,  and  that  the 
name  was  not  known  to  many  people."  Then,  after  expressing 
"  the  tenderness  to  the  friend  and  companion  of  our  boyhood, 
and  gratitude  to  him  who  has  enlivened  many  an  hour,  and 
added  so  much  to  our  stock  of  intellectual  happiness,"  the  arti- 
cle in  Blackwood  ends  by  affirming  that  "the  main  fact  con- 
tended for  by  M.  Llorente— that  is,  the  Spanish  origin  of  '  Gil 
L.  M.  8.-6 


1 62  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Bias' — is  undeniable;  and  the  subordinate  and  collateral  points 
of  his  system  [are]  invested  with  a  high  degree  of  probability." 

A  late  German  author  and  well-known  Spanish  scholar, 
Charles  Frederic  Franceson,  published  in  1857  a  pamphlet, 
written  in  French,  "  Essai  sur  la  Question  de  rOriginalite  de 
*  Gil  Bias,' "  in  which  he  defended  Le  Sage  against  the  accusa- 
tions of  Llorente.  In  this  essay  he  argues  thet  "  The  Bachelor 
of  Salamanca,"  being  published  after  "  Gil  Bias,"  can  only  be 
called  a  weakened  reflex  of  the  earlier  written  novel ;  that  there 
are  as  many  Spanish  words  and  phrases  in  Le  Sage's  avowed 
translations,  "  Le  Diable  Boiteux,"  "  Guzman  d'Alfarache,"  and 
"Estevanille  Gonsalez,"  as  in  "Gil  Bias;"  and  that  Spanish 
words  have  not  always  an  equivalent  in  French,  so  that  "  pre  " 
is  not  the  saijie  as  "prado,"  "maire"  as  "  corregidor,"  etc.  He 
further  observes  that  even  Voltaire,  who  did  not  know  Spanish 
well,  in  the  first  two  chapters  of  his  tale,  "  Jenni,  ou  TAthee,"  of 
which  the  action  takes  place  at  Barcelona,  employs  a  certain 
number  of  allegorical  names,  indicating  the  character  or  pro- 
fession of  the  personages  to  which  they  belong,  such  as  Sefiora 
Boca  Vermeja  (ruddy-mouth),  Senor  Don  Inigo  y  Mendrozo 
(coward),  and  some  others.  He  also  states  that  the  accusation 
that  Le  Sage  sometimes  writes  **  Juan,  Pedro,"  and  similar  Span- 
ish names,  and  sometimes  "Jean,  Pierre,"  in  French,  is  not  quite 
correct.  The  novelist  always  employs  Spanish  names  w^hen 
they  are  written  differently  from  French  ones,  and  often  accora- 
f)anies  them  by  "  Don ;"  but  when  they  are  identical,  or  nearly 
so,  in  both  languages,  he  writes  the  French  form,  as  "  Don  Gas- 
ton, don  Alphonse,  don  Louis,  don  Felix."  "  Dom"  is  not  the 
equivalent  of  the  Spanish  "  Don,"  but  is  applied  in  French  to 
certain  members  of  religious  orders;  "dame"  and  "maitre"  are 
used  by  Moliere  in  the  "  Avare,"  as  "  dame  Claude,"  "  maitre 
Jacques ;"" seigneur"  and  "cavalier"  are  only  written  to  give 
local  coloring  to  "Gil  Bias;"  the  four  lines  which  Don  Gaston 
de  Cogollos  sings  are  possibly  taken  from  a  Spanish  author, 
whilst  the  misspelling  of  proper  names,  towns,  places,  etc.,  iis 


WHO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS^'t  163 

probably  owing  to  printers*  errors  or  to  carelessness.  M.  Fran- 
ceson  gives  also  jn  his  pamphlet  the  translation  of  all  the  pas- 
sages which  Le  Sage  has  borrowed  from  Espinel's  **  Marcos  de 
Obregon/'  and  a  list  of  Spanish  authors  laid  under  contribution 
by  the  French  novel-writer,  as  well  as  the  original  passages  of 
Firenzuola's  Italian  translation  of  Apuleius's  "  Golden  Ass,"  from 
which  Gil  Bias's  adventures  in  the  cave  of  the  robbers  have  been 
taken. 

•*The  Chronology  of  the  Life  of  Gil  Bias,"  as  given  by  M.  Llo- 
rente,  is  wrong,  though  it  seems  ridiculous  to  treat  a  novel  like  an 
historical  work,  and  to  verify  every  date  on  which  certain  ac- 
,tions  of  the  hero  are  supposed  to  have  taken  place.  Gil  Bias  left 
Oviedo  when  he  was  seventeen  years  old  (bk.  i.  ch.  i),  and  about 
six  months  afterwards  Donna  Mencia  de  Mosquera  relates*  to 
him  that  her  husband  died  seven  years  ago,  when  the  Portu- 
guese army  was  at  Fez  (bk.  i.  ch.  1 1).  As  Don  Sebastian,  King 
of  Portugal,  went  in  1578  with  an  army  to  Morocco,  where  he 
was  killed  the  same  year.  Donna  Mencia  must  have  spoken  in 
1585 ;  therefore  Gil  Bias  was  born  in  1568,  and  not  in  1588,  as 
Llorente  says.  Then  arises  the  difficulty  of  explaining  how, 
some  time  after  Donna  Mencia's  adventure,  and  after  Portugal 
had  been  annex^  to  Spain  in  1580,  the  master  of  Gil  Bias,  Don 
Bernard  de  Castil-Blazo,  could  pass  for  a  spy  of  the  King  of 
Portugal  (bk.  iii.  ch.  i),  and  how  Don  Pompeyo  de  Castro  could 
mention  a  King  of  Portugal  when  no  such  monarch  existed — Le 
Sage,  in  the  later  editions  of  '*  Gil  Bias,"  altered  this  potentate 
into  a  King  of  Poland  (bk.  iii.  ch.  7) — and  how  Captain  Rolando 
could  say  to  Gil  Bias  (bk.  iii.  ch.  2)  that,  when  he  entered  the 
town  of  Leon,  the  people  would  not  have  been  more  eager  to 
see  him  if  he  had  been  a  Portuguese  general  taken  prisoner  in 
war.  Moreover,  Gil  Bias  was  imprisoned  in  the  tower  of  Sego- 
via a  few  months  before  the  dismissal  of  the  Duke  of  Lerma. 
which  took  place  in  1618.  Our  hero  was  then  fifty  years  old, 
and  married  Antonia  some  time  afterwards.  When  the  Count- 
Duke  of  Olivarez  was  exiled  in  1643,  Gil  Bias  would  be  more 


164  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

than  seventy;  yet,  nothing  daunted,  he  returns  to  his  estate 
after  the  count's  death  in  1646,  calls  himself  a  n)an  *'  who  begins 
to  grow  old,"  marries  again,  twenty-eight  years  after  his  first 
marriage,  a  young  lady  between  nineteen  and  twenty,  and  begets 
two  children,  "  of  whom  he  devoutly  believes  himself  to  be  the 
father." 

It  must  be  obvious  that  any  literary  man,  before  beginning  to 
write  such  a  work  as  "  Gil  Bias"  and  to  describe  the  events  of 
such  an  adventurous  career  at  a  peculiar  period  of  history  and 
in  a  particular  country,  would  consult  the  different  travels  and 
descriptions  of  the  land  in  which  his  story  takes  place — would, 
so  to  speak,  try  to  assimilate  himself  with  the  natives,  and,  by  dint 
of  reading  and  studying,  become,  as  it  were,  bone  of  their  bone 
and  flesh  of  their  flesh.  In  this  article  ^he  attempt  will  be  made 
to  prove  that  Le  Sage  did  so.  Let  it,  however,  be  remembered 
that  the  first  two  volumes  of  **  Gil  Bias"  were  published  in  171 5, 
the  third  in  1721,  and  the  last  in  1735. 

{a)  Le  Sage  acquired  tjje  habits  and  customs  of  Spain  (see 
Nos.  1-7,  page  6)  in  some  of  the  books  which  he  perused*  The 
traveling  by  mules  and  the  filthy  state  of  the  beds  is  mentioned : 
'"Le  samedi  quatrieme  d'octobre,  ayant  change  de  mules,  je 
partis  de  Pampelone,  ayant  achete  des  draps  a^ause  de  la  mal- 
proprete  des  lits."  *  The  same  book  speaks  of  the  subterranean 
caves  in  Castile,  where  it  is  said  "  the  Spaniards  retired  during 
the  time  of  the  Moors" — though  Le  Sage  places  the  cave  of 
^Lolando  in  the  Asturias — and  of  the  bull-fights  "  at  Erija,  five 
leagues  from  Fuentes  .  .  .  where  there  were  four  noblemen 
(Caballeros  en  Plaza),  who  fought  all  dressed  in  black,  and  with 
feathers  in  their  hats."  The  Countess  d'Aulnoy  t  describes  also 
at  full  length  a  bull-fight  which  took  place  at  Madrid  in  1679, 
where  six  noble  knights  were  engaged,  and  she  mentions  another 
fight  in  her  "  Memoires."  %    In  her  "  Relation"  §  she  employs  the 

*  **  Journal  du  Voyage  d'Espagne,"  etc.    Paris,  1669. 

t  "  Relation  du  Voyage  en  Espagne."    Paris,  1690.    Lettre  X. 

X  **  Memoires  de  la  Cour  d'Espagne.'*    Paris,  X690.         |  Lettre  VIII. 


WHO   WROTE   ''GIL  BIAS''?  165 

phmse  "  r6citer  le  rosaire,"  and  says  that  all  the  Spanish  ladies 
have  one  "attache  a  leur  ceinture/'  The  same  book  gives  also 
many  examples  of  the  tricks  of  inn-keepers  in  Spain.  The 
leathern  bag  of  wine  is  spoken  of  by  her:*  "The  wine  is  put  in 
prepared  goat-skins,  and  it  always  smells  of  pitch  or  burning." 
Another  book  of  travels t  says  that  "they  (the  Spaniards)  have 
no  other  casks  but  goat-skins,  which  they  call  Bollegos,  and 
which  are  so  pitched  that  when  I  drink  I  seem  to  swallow  the 
awl  (le  Saint  Crespin)  of  a  shoemaker."  The  Countess,  in  speak- 
.  ing  of  the  condemned  to  death,  states:  J  "  Les  lots  du  royaume 
de  Valence  .  .  .  accordent  quelques  jours  aux  criminels  apres 
qu'ils  ont  6te  juges."  Le  Sage  says  that  this  law  existed  also  in 
Leon.  The  particular  bull  allowing  the  Spanish  kings  to  appoint 
archbishops  is  spoken  of  by  Lenglet  du  Fresnoy,§  who  says: 
"Le  Roi  seul,  en  vertu  dTndults  du  Saint  Siege,  nomme  aux 
6v^ches  en  Espagne."  What  "  indults"  are  is  to  be  found  in 
Richelet's  Dictionary.  1719:  "  II  y  a  deux  sortes  d'indults,  actifs 
ct  passifs.  Les  indults  actifs  donnent  le  pouvoir  de  nommer  et 
presenter  des  benefices  et  de  les  conferer.  Les  papes  Accordent 
ces  indults  aux  Princes,  aux  Cardinaux,  aux  Arcjiev^ues, 
Ev^ques  et  autres  Prelats."  M.  Llorente  also  pretends  that  the 
use  of  chocolate  was  unknown  in  France  at  the  time  Le  Sage 
wrote  "Gil  Bias;"  but  Brillat-Savarin,  in  his  "Physiologie  du 
GoAt,"  saysj :  "  During  the  beginning  of  the  Regency  (1715-23), 
chocolate  was  in  more  general  use  than  coffee ;  because  it  was 
then  taken  as  an  agreeable  nourishment,  whilst  coffee  was  only 
looked  upon  as  a  curious  and  extravagant  drink." 

ip)  The  words  and  passages  in  "  Gil  Bias,"  evidently  translated 
from  the  Spanish  (see  No.  8,  page  7),  and  which  are  said  not  to 
be  French,  were  partly  used,  as  M.  Franceson  has  already 
stated,  to  give  a  local  coloring  to  the  original,  and  are,  as  such, 

*  Lettre  IX.  t  "  Relation  de  Madrid."    Cologne,  1665. 

X  "  M^moires  de  la  Cour  d'Espagne." 
%  *'  M^thode  pour  ^tudier  la  G^graphie.**    Vol.  VI.,  1716. 
I  '*  Meditation  VI.,"  Section  2,  %  10. 


l66  ^       THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

found  in  some  of  the  books  of  travels  which  have  been  men-- 
tioned.  The  Countess  d'Aulnoy*  uses  "Sefior  cordonnier, 
hidalgos,  sefior  escudero,  oidor,  I'HCpital  de  los  Niiios.  la  famosa 
coraedia."  Another  traveler  in  Spain,  a  Dutch  diplomatist, 
Aarsens  van  Somraelsdyck,  who  wrote  in  French, t  says  also, 
*'  Entre  eux  ils  se  traitent  de  Sefiores  Cavalleros."  {  Le  Sage 
appears  not  always  to  have  lodged  the  actors  in  the^  "  posadas 
de  los  representantes"  (see  No.  9.  page  7),  for  Laura  relates  to 
Gil  Bias  that  Phenicia  lived  *•  with  the  whole  troop  in  a  large 
h6tel  garni"  (bk.  vii.  ch.  7). 

(r)  The  dinner-hour  was  twelve  o'clock  in  Paris  as  well  as  in 
Madrid  (see  No.  5,  page  6).  Boileau,  in  his  third  Satire,  written 
in  1665,  the  very  year  of  Philip  IV.'s  death,  says  that,  "coming 
from  Mass,  P.  hastens  to  a  dinner  to  which  he  was  invited,  just 
as  the  clock  struck  twelve." 

(^)  Llorente  accuses  Le  Sage  of  not  knowing  his  own  lan- 
guage (see  No.  11,  page  7).  or,  in  other  words,  of  introducing 
Spanish  expressions  into  French.  This  accusation  is  totally 
wrong.  Nearly  all  of  the  words  or  phrases  quoted  as  not 
French  are  to  be  found  in  Richelet's  Dictionary,  of  which  the 
third  edition,  which  I  have  consulted,  was  published  in  1719.- 
There  we  see  "cavalier"  described  as  "^entilhomme  qui  porte 
I'epee;"  "seigneur,"  sometimes  used  "en  riant,"  as  "Seigneurs 
Chevaliers  Catalans;"  "a  Dieu  ne  plaise;"  "graces  a  Dieu," 
though  not  "au  ciel;"  but.  says  the  French  lexicographer. 
"  cette  expression  est  basse ;"  "  rendre  graces,  rendre  des  actions 
des  graces,"  though  not  "rendre  de  tres-humbles  graces;'* 
"femrae  de  bien  et  d'honneur."  Richelet  has  also  "famille," 
"  viceroi,"  "benefice  simple;"  he  defines  "laboureur"  as  "celui 
qui  cultive  la  terre  avec  la  charue"  (sic),  and  gives  as  an  example 
"  un  riche  laboureur,"  which  expression  Le  Sage  likewise  uses 
("  Gil  Bias,"  bk.  v.  ch.  i),  and  which  evidently  cannot  mean  *'  a 
rich  day-laborer,"  as    Llorente    thinks    it  does.      "Disciple." 

*  "  Relation  du  Voyage  en  Espagne. 

t  **  Voyage  d'Espagne'*  (fait  en  1655),  etc.    Cologne,  x666.       X  Ibid. 


WHO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS'*?  167 

« 

spelled  "diciple/*  is  defined  as  "ecolier;"  "fameux,"  which,  ac- 
cording to  Llorente,  no  Frenchman  would  use  in  the  sense  of 
"c61ebre,"  was,  according  to  Richelet,  precisely  employed  in  that 
sense  in  Le  Sage's  time.  Llorente  says  about  the  word  "direc- 
teur":  "Only  a  Spaniard,  or  at  least  some  one  who  has  lived  a 
long  time  in  Spain,  can  know  the  difference  between  a  monk 
who  is  only  seen  in  the  confessional,  and  a  very  reverend  father, 
of  the  *  Cordon  Alto,*  of  the  •  Haut  Cordon,'  who  is  called  spirit- 
ual director  of  consciences,  and  whom  the  devotees  treat  to 
pigeons,  partridges,  and  other  little  dainty  dishes."  In  Riche- 
let's  Dictionary  "directeur"  is  defined  as  the  "ordinary  confes- 
sor of  a  person,"  and  the  two  following  lines  are  quoted  from 
Boileau's  tenth  "Satire":  "But  of  all  mortals,  thanks  to  the 
pious  souls,  none  is  so  well  cared  for  as  a  directeur  d6  femmes." 
The  Countess  d'Aulnoy  says  in  her  "  Relation  du  Voyage  en 
Espagne":*  "  M.  Mellini,  the  Apostolic  Nuncio,  consecrated  the 
*  patriarche  des  Indes'  on  Trinity,  and  the  king  was  present." 

{e)  The  local  knowledge  of  Spanish  towns  disp4ayed  by  Le 
Sage  (see  No.  12,  page  7)  might  easily  have  been  acquired;  for 
in  d'Aulnoy's  "  Relation,"  in  the  thirteenth  letter,  the  Countess 
says :  "  We  went  to  hear  mass  in  the  Church  de  Los  Reys  at 
Toledo."  t  The  "  Maison  des  Repenties,"  to  which  Sirenaissent 
("  Gil  Bias,'*  bk.  ix.  ch.  7),  may  have  been  an)rwhere ;  the  Coun- 
tess d'Aulnoy  speaks  of  one  in  her  "  Relation ;"  and  so  she  does 
four  times  of  the  existence  of  a  convent,  "  Las  Descalzas  Reales," 
called  by  Le  Sage  "Monastere  de  I'lncamation,"  where  the 
widows  and  mistresses  of  the  kings  of  Spain  used  to  retire.  In 
the  third  letter  she  says :  "  Philip  IV.  preferred  Maria  Calderona 
to  a  young  lady  of  noble  birth  who  was  in  attendance  on  the 
Queen,  and  who  was  so  hurt  by  the  fickleness  of  the  King,  whom 
she  really  loved,  an4  by  whom  she  had  a  son,  that  she  withdrew 
to  Las  Descalzas  Reales,  where  she  became  a  nun.    .    .    .    The 

♦  Lcttre  X. 

t  Lldrente  says  the  knowledge  of  the  Church  de  los  Reyes  at  Toledo  **  est  une  des 
preuves  irr^cusables  de  Textstence  d'un  manuscrit  espagnol." 


l68  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

King  sent  word  to  La  Calderona  that  she  had  to  go  in  a  nun- 
nery, as  it.  is  the  custom  when  the  King  quits  his  mistress."  In 
the  ninth  letter  the  Countess  writes :  "This  order  of  the  Car- 
melites is  held  here  in  great  veneration.  Even  Queens,  when 
they  become  widows,  are  obliged  to  spend  with  them  the  rest  of 
their  lives.  Don  Juan  (himself  the  illegitimate  son  of  Philip 
IV.)  has  an  illegitimate  daughter  who  is  a  Carmelite  nun.  She 
is  wonderfully  beautiful,  and  it  is  said  that  she  did  not  wish  to 
take  the  veil ;  but  it  was  her  destiny,  and  so  it  is  the  fate  of 
many  others  of  her  rank,  who  are  scarcely  more  satisfied  about 
it  than  she  was.  These  nuns  are  called  Descalzas  Reales,  which 
means  *  royal  ladies.'  This  rule  applies  even  to  the  King's  mis- 
tresses, wiiether  they  are  unmarried  or  widows.  When  he  ceases 
to  love  them,  they  must  become  nuns."  The  Countess  repeats 
this  in  her  fifteenth  and  last  letter,  and  also  in  her  "  Memoires." 
The  knowledge  that  there  was  such  a  convent,  says  the  author 
of  the  article  in  Blackwood,  is  "  a  still  stronger  argument  in  favor 
of  the  existence  of  a  Spanish  manuscript."  Calling  the  Prado 
of  Madrid  by  its  right  name,  and  quoting  the  "  Rue  des  Infantes," 
is  not  to  be  wondered  at,  for  there  were  several  guide-books  of 
Madrid  printed  before  "  Gil  Bias"  was  published.  The  mention- 
ing of  so  many  provinces,  large  and  small  towns,  afid  villages  of 
Spain,  is  hot  marvelous,  as  there  existed  many  geographical 
hand-books  of  Spain,  written  in  Latin,  as  well  as  Colmenar's 
"Delices  d'Espagne  et  de  Portugal."  1707,  translated  into 
French,  and  dll  published  long  before  "  Gil  Bias"  saw  the  light. 
A  large  number  of  these  names  are  also  given  in  the  books  of 
travels  in  Spain  already  mentioned.  The  titles  of  the  dukes, 
counts,  and  celebrated  persons  to  be  found  in  "Gil  Bias"  may- 
be discovered  in  d'Aulnoy's  "Voyage,"  in  Ijer  "  Memoires  de  la' 
Cour  d'Esp'dgne,"  in  Salazar's  "  Inventaire,"  *  and  in  many  other 
works.  I  find,  in  the  "Inventaire"  alone,  the  names  of  tli^'"*>,^ 
nobles,  their  residences  and  incomes,  with  a  list  of  archbisnops 

*  Salazar,  **  Inventaire  g^n^ral  des  plus  curieiues  recherches  Afi&  royaumes  d'Es*  . 

agne,  U-aduit  de  TEspagnol.    Paris,  1615.  I 


\ 


WHO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS"?  169 

and  bishops,  viscounts,  generals,  admirals,  priors,  commander- 
ies;  and  also  the  councils  and  councilors,  presidents,  auditors, 
secretaries,  and  other  officers,  and  the  way  they  are  appointed, 
as  well  as  their  diflferent  incomes.  In  this  little  book  are  like- 
wise given  lists  of  the  officers  of  the  king's  household,  their  sal- 
aries and  pensions ;  and  at  the  end  of  it  a  table  showing  the 
distances  between  the  different  towns  and  villages.  In  the 
Countess's  "  Memoires  "  there  is  a  list  of  the  archbishops,  bish- 
ops, and  diflferent  grandees  of  Spain  ;  she  also  relates  the  history 
of  the  Admirante  of  Castile,  a  title  abolished  when  Le  Sage 
wrote,  but  not  when  the  Countess  penned  her  book.  To  say 
that  forty-five  Spanish  names,  such  as  those  of  Mrs.  Slipslop  and 
Parson  Trulliber  (see  No.  13,  page  8),  were  not  likely  to  be  in- 
vented by  any  but  a  Spaniard  seems  to  me  to  be  forgetting  that 
Le  Sage  was  an  accomplished  Spanish  scholar;  but,  even  if  he 
were  "  only  acquainted  with  the  lighter  part  of  Spanish  litera- 
ture," he  might  easily  have  compounded  these  names.  The 
orthographical  mistakes  (see  No.  i,  page  8)  are,  as  Mr.  Franceson 
has  already  observed,  chiefly  printers*  errors  or  faults  of  careless- 
ness; though  many  of  them,  such  as  "Contador,"  "Miyadas," 
•*  Majuelo,"  and  "  Pliego,"  are  rightly  spelled  in  the  early  editions 
of  "Gil  Bias.''  The  supposed  error  of  Le  Sage  in  imagining 
""seigneur,"  "Sefior,"  and  "  seigneurie,"  "Sefioria,"  to  be  equiva- 
lent, and  on  which  so  much  stress  has  been  laid  by  M.  Llorente, 
as  proving  that  the  French  author  must  have  plagiarized  from  a 
Spanish  manuscript,  without  understanding  what  he  did  (see 
No.  2,  page  8),  is  no  error  at  all.*  Le  Sage  uses  tf^p.word  "  seig- 
neurie" in  *'  Gil  Bias"  twelve  times : 

r.  When  speaking  of  the  actresses  who  treat  great  lords 
familiarly,  and  who,  far  from  addressing  them  as  "  Excellencies, 
ne  leur  donnaient  pas  m^me  de  la  seigneuwe"  (bk.  iii.  ch.  10). 

2"*.  Don  Rodrigo  de  Calderon  calls  Gil  Bias  "  Seigneur  de  San- 
tillane ;"  "  he,"  says  Gil  Bias,  "  who  had  never  yet  addressed  me 

*  Llorente  says  distinctly  about  the  use  of  the  word  ^*  seigneurie  " :  *^  Le  Sage 
n^eatendait  pas  mSme  ce  qu'il  copiait." 


I70  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

in  any  otlier  way  but  as  *  vous,  sans  jamais  se  servir  du  terme  de 
seigneurie ' "  (bk.  viii.  ch.  5). 

3*.  Don  Roger  de  Rada,  when  relating  his  adventures,  says  to 
Gil  Bias,  "de  peur  d'ennuyer  votre  seigneurie"  (bk.  viii.  ch.  8). 

4<».     Fabricio  addresses  Gil  Bias  as  "  Seigneur  de  Santillane," 
and  then  as  "  Seigneur,  I  am  delighted  with  the  prosperity  of 
your  seigneurie;"  upon  which  Gil  Bias  replies,  "  Oh  !  que  diable  !  i 
treve  de  seigneur  et  de  seigneurie"  (bk.  viii,  ch.  9). 

5*.  As  love-messenger  of  the  Prince  of  Spain,  Gil  Bias  is  ad- 
dressed by  the  Sefiora  Mencia  as  **  votre  seigneurie"  (bk.  viii. 
ch.  10). 

6*.     Gil  Bias  says  of  himself,  "Gabriel  Salero  thought  that  he 
had  found  in  'ma  seigneurie*  the  best  match  in  Spain  for  his  , 
daughter"  (bk.  ix.  ch.  i). 

7*.  Gil  Bias  addresses  Sefior  Manuel  Ordoflez :  "  My  friend 
Fabricio  would  have  done  much  better  to  remain  with  your 
*  seigneurie '  than  to  cultivate  poetry"  (bk.  x.  ch.  2). 

8".  In  stopping  at  the  house  of  Don  Alphonso  de  Leyva  at 
Valencia,  Gil  Bias  relates :  "  I  found  in  my  room  a  good  bed, 
on  which  my  '  seigneurie,'  having  laid  down,  fell  asleep"  (bk.  x. 
ch.  5). 

9°.  Joseph  Navarro  says  to  Gil  Bias :  "  My  master  has  prom- 
ised to  speak  for  you  to  the  Count  of  Olivarez  *  sur  le  bien  que 
je  lui  ai  dit  de  votre  seigneurie  * "  (bk.  xi.  ch.  3). 

10 .  Scipio  addresses  Gil  Bias :  "  You  see  that  fortune  has   - 
great  designs  on  *  votre  seigneurie ' "  (bk.  xi.  ch.  6). 

1 1^  The  dancing-master,  Martin  Ligero,  says  to  Gil  Bias :  "  I 
have  been  told  that  it  is  *  votre  seigneurie '  who  selects  the  mas- 
ters for  my  lord  Don  Henry"  (bk.  xii.  ch.  5). 

I2«.  Scipio  declares  to  Gil  Bias:  "I  like  better  a  good  office 
with  *  votre  seigneurie  *  than  to  be  again  exposed  to  Ihe  perils  of 
the  sea"  (bk  xii.  ch.  6). 

In  none  of  these  cases  can  "seigneurie"  mean  "Sefioria,"a 
title  only  given  to  Spanish  grandees.  In  the  first  two  examples 
Le  Sage  uses  the  word  rightly,  as  it  was  then  employed  in 


fVIfO  WROTE   ''GIL  BLAS"?  I/X 

French  for  "  title  given  by  the  estate."  In  the  last  ten  examples 
he  seems  to  apply  this  expression  en  riant,  or  for  the  sake  of 
civility.* 

(/)  The  anecdote  about  the  rector  of  the  University  of  Sala- 
manca (See  No.  3,  page  8)  is  certainly  not  in  accordance  with 
Spanish  manners,  but  only  demonstrates  that,  however  careful 
an  author  may  be,  the  difficulties  of  letting  the  scenes  of  a  novel 
take  place  on  foreign  ground  must  some  time  or  other  induce 
him  to  commit  an  error. 

{g)  The  accusation  of  the  many  topographical  errors  to  be 
found  in  "Qil  Bias"  (see  No.  4,  page  8),  of  which  the  enumera- 
tion is  borrowed  from  Llorente,  and  which  errors  are  partly  re- 
produced by  Blackwood,  has  been  accepted  by  all  Le  Sage's 
defenders  as  true.  But,  if  they  had  consulted  two  maps  of 
Spain — a  large  one.  ''Carte  nouvelle  du  royaume  d'Espagne, 
dediee  a  Sa  Majeste  Catholique  Philippe  V./'  Paris,  1705 ;  and  a 
smaller  one,  "  L'Espagne  divisee  en  tous  ses  royaumee,  princi- 
pautes,  etc.,  a  I'lisage  de  Monseigneur  le  due  de  Bourgogne," 
Amsterdam,  1710 — they  would  have  found  that  Le  Sage  was 
nearly  always  right.  Notwithstanding  all  that  has  been  said  to 
the  contrary,  Betancos,  Rodillas,  Grajal  (bk.  i.  ch.  n),  Moyados, 
Valpuesta  (bk.  ii.  ch.  9),  Lucenot  (bk.  iii.  ch.  2),  Villardesa  and 
Almodabar  (bk.  iv.  ch.  1 1) — spelled  on  the  large  map  Villards- 
saz  and  Almodovar,  on  the  small  map  Villardesaz  and  Almoda- 

♦  Richelet,  iri  his  Dictionary,  defines  **  seig^deurie  "  as  "  une  terrc  seigneuriale," 
and  quotes  from  Molifere's  "  L'Ecole  des  Femmes"  (Act  I.  sc.  i)  Chrysalde's  lines 
to  Amolpbet  who  had  adopted  the  name  of  Monsieur  de  la  Souche : 
**"  Que  diable  vous  a  fait  aussi  vous  aviser 
A  quarante  et  deux  ans  de  vous  dJibaptiser, 
£t  d^un  vieux  tronc  pburri  de  votre  m^tairie 
Vous  faire  dans  le  monde  un  nom  de  seigneurie  ?** 
Ricfaelet  says  also,  *" seigneurie*  is  used  en  riant,  and  has  the  same  meaning  as 
'  signoria '  among  the  Italians,  when  they  speak  to  a  person  civilly ;"  and  then  he 
quotes  from  MoU^e's  "  Cocu  Imaginaire  " :  "Trfes-humble  serviteur  i  votre  seig- 
neurie." 

t  Llorente  says  in  bis  "  Observations'* :  "  II  n*y  a  cuen  Espagne  aticua  TiUagc  du 
nom  de  Luceno.*' 


1'J2  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

var— Castil  Blazo  *  (bk.  v.  ch.  i),  Llirias  (bk.  ix.  ch.  lo),  Melilla, 
Toralva  (bk.  v.  ch.  i),  Ponte  de  Duero  (bk.  ii.  ch.  8),  are  all,  in 
their  right  places  and  well  spelt,  whilst  Almerin  (bk.  v.  ch.  i), 
which  ought  to  have  been  Almoharin  according  to  M.  Llorente, 
is  printed  so  on  the  small  map,:but  figures  on  the  large,  one  as 
"Lmorin,"  with  the  usual  sign  of  a  town  before  it,  which  makes 
it  look  like  **  Almorin."  All  these  names  were  not  altered  in 
later  editions,  but  are  to  be  found  in  the  edition  of  "  Gil  Bias" 
published  in  three  volumes,  Paris,  1721,  and  also  in  the  first  one 
in  four  volumes,  Paris,  1735,  except  that  "  Carrillo" — another  of 
Le  Sage's  supposed  misspellings  discovered  by  M.  Llorente — 
was  correctly  printed  in  the  edition  of  1721,  bnt  with  only  one  r 
in  the  one  published  fourteen  y^rs  later.  Le  Sage's  Orbisa  (bk. 
X,  ch,  10)  ought  to  be  Cobisa.  Penafiel  is  mentioned  as  lying  on 
the  road  from  Segovia  to  Valladolid  (bk.  x.  ch.  i) ;  "this  ought 
to  be  Portillo,"  says  Llorente,  because  Valladolid  is  twelve  leagues 
from  Pefiafiel,  and  therefore  it  is  impossible  to  arrive  there  in 
one  day."  Portillo  is  certainly  on  the  road  between  Valladolid 
and  Segovia,  but  it  seems  not  impossible  to  go,  twelve  leagues 
when  one  has,  like  Gil  Bias,  */  une  chaise  tiree  par  deux  bonnes 
mules."  But  M.  Llorente  is  difficult  to  please.  When  Gil  Bias 
leaves  Oviedo,  after  his  father's  death,  and  continues  his  jour^ 
ney  (bk.  x.  ch.  8)  "  a  petites  journees,"  our  Spanish  critic  ob- 
serves that  a  carriage  drawn  by  two  mules  ought  not  to  go  at  so 
slow  a  pace,  The  blunder  of  placing  Alcala  de  Henarez  on  the 
road  from  Madrid  to  S^ovia  seems  to  be  Le  Sage's  own.  The 
author  of  the  article  in  BlackWood  asks:  "  If  Le  Sage  had  in- 
vented the  story,  and  clothed  it  with  names  of  Spanish  cities 
and  villages,  taken  from  printed  books,  can  any  one  suppose 
that  he  would  have  fallen  hito  all  these  errors?"  It  has  been 
proved  that  they  are  not  errors'  of  Le  Sage,  but  of  M.  Llorente ; 
though,  in  jnstice  to  this  gentleman,  it  ought  to  be  stated  that 

♦  Llorente  writes:  "  Le  traducteur  Isla  s'est  pennis  d^omettre  les  mots  (Castil- 
titie  OTfry^i^'il  savait  bien  quMl  n'y  avait  point  de  pays  de  ce  nom  en  Espagne.*' 

Le  Sage  use?**' "*^*"*^^"^^'  *^°**"'^*"*^^'"^**^^*^"" 


JVJ/0  WROTE  '*GJL  BLAS"?  1/3^ 

several  of  the  towns  mentioned  by  the  French  author  arc  not ' 
found  on  modern  maps. 

{k)  In  a  novel,  even  a  so-called  historical  one,  errors  are  gen- 
erally found ;  how  much  more  arc  these,  then,  to  be  exp>ected  in 
a  tale  like  "Gil  Bias"?  Le  Sage  attempted  to  correct  one  of 
these  errors  which  occurs  in  the  history  related  by  Don  Pompeyo 
de  Castro,  by  transferring  the  scene  from  Portugal  to  Poland ; 
"  but  how  comes  it  pass."  asks  the  author  of  the  article  in  Black- 
wood, **that  Le  Sage,  who  singles  out  with  such  painful  anxiety 
the  error  to  which  we  have  adverted,  suffers  others  of  equal  im- 
portance to  pass  altogether  unnoticed  ?"  (See  No.  5,  page  8.) 
This  assertion  is  not  quite  correct,  for  the  following  notice  pre- 
faced the  edition  of  "Gil  Bias"  of  1735  • 

"  In  the  third  volume  an  epoch  is  mentioned  (the  time  of  the 
flight  of  Laura  with  Zendono  tp  Portugal)  which  does  not  agree 
with  the  history  of  Don  Pompeyo  de  Castro,  to  be  found. in  the 
first  volume  (bk.  iii.  ch.  7),  It  appears  that  Philip  the  Seqpnd 
had  not  yet  conquered  Portugal  *  and  we  see  here  suddenly  this 
kingdom  under  the  sway  of  Philip  the  Third,t  without  Gil  Bias 
being  much  the  older  for  it.  This  is  a  chronological  fault  which 
the  author  has  perceived  too  Jate,  but  which  he  promises  to  cor- 
rect later,  as  well  as  many  others,  if  ever  a  new  edition  of  his 
works  should  appear."  .  / 

He  corrected  this  fault  there  and  then,  and  left  the  others  to  be 
altered  afterwards.  But  in  1735  Le  Sage  was  sixty-seven  years 
old ;  and  increasing  infirmities,  and  other  literaryjabor  probably 
prevented  him  from  accomplishing  what  he  intended.  To  argue 
from  this — as  is  idbne  in  Blackwood's  Magazine — that  Le  Sage 
left  "to  posterity  a  lasting  and  unequivocal  proof  of  his  plagia- 
rism .  .  .  by  dwelling  on  one  anachronism  as  an  error  which 
he  intended  to  correct,  in  a  work  swarming  in  every  part  with 
others  equally  flagrant,  of  which  he  takes  no  notice,"  is,  to  say  the 
least  of  it,  a  general  accusation  which  requires  other  proofs  than 

♦  The  Duke  of  Alba  conquered  Portugal  in  1586.    (Original  note  of  Le  Sage.) 
t  Philip  III-  began  to  reign  in  1598,  and  died  in  1621.  (Original  note  of  Le  Sage 


If 4  ^-^^  LIBRARY  MAQAZINE. 

the  remark  that  these  mistakes  were  those  "  irfto  which  the  origi- 
nal author  had  fallen,  and  which,  as  his  object  was  not  to  give  an 
exact  relation  of  facts,  he  probably  disregarded  altogether." 
However,  what  is  excusable  in  a  Spaniard  must  equally  be  so  in 
a  Frenchman. 

(/)  In  extenuation  of  the  errors  of  Le  Sage  himself  (see  No.  6, 
page  8)  may  be  brought  forward  the  remark  about  these  being 
mistakes  "which  the  original  author  .  .  .  probably  disregarded 
altogether."  Moreover,  there  is  a  lapse  of  fourteen  years  between 
the  publication  of  the  third  and  fourth  volumes  of  "  Gil  Bias." 
and  therefore  Le  Sage  may  well  have  forgotten  that  the  hero  of 
his  novel,  after  having  left  the  tower  o\  Segovia,  says  to  Don 
Alphonso  de  Leyva,  in  the  third  volume,  that  "four  months  ago 
he  occupied  an  important  post  at  Court"  (bk.  ix.  ch.  lo) ;  and 
may  have  allowed  Gil  Bias  to  tell  the  king,  in  the  first  book  of 
the  fourth  volume,  that  "he  had  been  six  months  in  prison"  (bk. 
xi.  ch.  2).  That  Le  Sage  was  very  negligent  in  writing  his  fourth 
volume  is  also  proved  by  the  supposed  age  of  the  hero  of  his 
novel,  as  compared  with  his  birth  and  adventures,  described  in 
the  first  three  volumes.  The  error  of  mentioning  the  dismissal 
of  the  Duke  of  Lerma,  when  Philip  IIL  died,  instead  of  saying 
"the  Duke  of  Uzeda,  son  of  the  Duke  of  Lerma,"  can  only  be 
accounted  for  by  carelessness,  for  Le  Sage  speaks  rightly  of  the 
exile  of  the  Duke  of  Uzeda  in  another  part  of  "Gil  Bias"  (bk. 
xi.  ch.  5).  It  seems  to  have  been  a  fancy  of  our  auth6r  to  call 
Valcancel  Valcazar;  for  the  whole  history  of  Don  Henry  de 
Guzman  was  published  in  many  books  well  known  at  the  time 
Le  Sage  wrote. 

(t)  M.  Franceson  has  already  stated  that  "The  Bachelor  of 
Salamanca,"  published  after  "  Gil  Bias,"  is  a  weakened  reproduc- 
tion of  this  last  novel.  Mr.  Ticknor,  one  of  the  best  Spanish, 
scholars  of  modern  times,  says,  in  his  "History  of  Spanish  Lit- 
erature," that  two  chapters  of  "The  Bachelor"  are  taken  from 
Moreto's  play,  "  Desd6n  con  el  Desd6n,"  whilst  Sainte-Beuve 
maintains  that  several  chapters  are  borrowed  from  Ths.  Gage» 


ir^o  WROTE  ''OIL  BLAS'^r  175 

the  English- American,  "  His  Travail  by  Sea  and  by  Land ;  or,  a 
New  Survey  of  the  West  Indies,  containing  a  Journall  of  three 
thousand  and  three  hundred  miles  within  the  main  land  of 
America,  etc.,"  London,  1648,  which  was  translated  into  French 
by  Le  Sieur  de  Beaulieu,  H.  O'Neil  (i.e.  A.  Baillet),  Paris,  1677. 
It  becomes  therefore  difficult  to  see  how  "  The  Bachelor"  can 
have  formed  part  of  an  original  Spanish  manuscript  long  in  the 
possession  of  the  Marquis  de  Lyonne  and  his  son;  for  a  great 
deal  of  the  French  work  appears  to  have  been  borrowed  from 
printed  books,  one  of  them  not  even  translated  into  Spanish.* 
As  for  "Gil  Bias,"  Llorente  and  Blackwood  both  mention  that 
two-thirds  of  this  novel  are  taken  from  well-known  Spanish 
works.  If,  therefore,  Le  Sage  copied  **  Gil  Bias"  from  a  manu- 
script of  de  Solis,  that  manuscript  was  chiefly  composed  of  pla- 
giarisms, and  the  Spanish  author  must  have  been  more  stupid 
than  men  ordinarily  are  to  steal  from  books  so  well  known  in 
Spain  and  to  his  contemporaries.  Moreover,  if  the  "  literary 
larcenies"  committed  in  "  Gil  Bias"  amount  to  so  lieavy  a  bulk, 
how  can  Le  Sage  have  pilfered  his  world-famed  novel  from  a 
manuscript?  There  is  not  the  shadow  of  an  evidence  that  he 
has  done  so.  The  readers  of  this  article  will  have  seen  how  Le 
Sage  became  possessed  of  his  intimate  knowledge  of  Sp)ain,  and, 
may  also  have  perceived  that  his  French  was  not  quite  so  bad 
as  M.  LForente  wishes  to  prove  it,  nor  that  his  errors  were  as 
manifold,  and,  in  fact,  as  clearly  faults  of  a  copyist,  as  his  liter- 
ary enemies  desire  to  make  it  oat. 

The  life  of  an  author  is  not  that  of  a  sybarite.  -,It  is  passed  in 
laborious  and  sedentary  occupations,  which  are  generally  re- 
warded by  a  not  over-abundant  pay,  and  cause  many  mental 
anxieties.  Envy,  hatred,  and  malice  not  seldom  attack  him 
whilst  he  is  alive,  and  are  not  even  silenced  after  his  death.'  The 
career  of  Le  Sage  is  no  exception  to  this  almost  general  rule. 

*  In  justice  to  M.  Llorente  it  ought  to  be  stated  that  he  says  in  his  ^  Observa^ 
tions,"  ch.  i. :  "On  pourrait  bien  soutenir  que  Le  Sage  est  Tauteur  original  d*une 
grande  partie  du  *Bachelier,'  beaucoup  plus  qu'il  ne  le  fut  du  *Gil  Bias.*  " 


176  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

He  was  no  flatterer  of  the  great ;  he  did  not  attach  himself  to 
any  then  existing  party  or  influential  nobleman  ;  and  he  dared 
to  have  opinions  of  his  own.  He  was  not  to  be  bribed,  worked 
hard  for  his  daily  bread,  and  gained  a  mere  pittance ;  and  he  was 
finally  obliged,  by  increasing  age  and  infirmities,  to  take  shelter 
with  his  only  living  son,  a  clergyman  at  Boulogne-sur-Mer,  where 
he  died.  His  fame,  of  course,  increased  when  he  was  no  longer 
alive  to  give  umbrage ;  but  this  did  not  prevent  a  few  of  his  con- 
temporaries from  attacking  his  works,  and,  above  all,  his  mas- 
terpiece, "Gil  Bias."  Voltaire  and  others  began  the  fray,  the 
Spaniards  took  it  up  through  national  vanity,  and  they  suc- 
ceeded in  making  some  critics  believe  what  they  brought  forward, 
and  in  maJking  not  a  few  literary  men  incline  to  the  opinion  that 
"Gil  Bias"  was  merely  a  copy  of  a  Spanish  manuscript.  If  that 
delosion  has  been  dispelled  by  the  present  article,  the  labor 
bestowed  upon  it  has  not  been  in  vain. 

K^NRi  Van  Laun,  in  The  Gentleman's  Magazine, 


THE  MORALITY  OF  THE  PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS. 

The  profession  of  letters  has  been  lately  debated  in  the  public 
prints ;  and  it  has  been  debated,  to  put  the  matter  mildly,  from 
a  point  of  view  that  was  calculated  to  surprise  high-minded 
men,  and  bring  a  general  contempt  on  books  and  reading. 
Some  time  ago,  in  particular,  a  lively,  pleasant,  popular  writer 
devoted  an  essay,  lively  and  pleasant  like  himself,  to  a  very  en- 
couraging view  of  the  pirofes^ion.  We  may  be  glad  that  his 
experience  is  so  cheering,  and  we  may  hope  that  all  others  who 
deserve  it  shall  be  as  handsomely  rewarded ;  but  I  do  not  think 
we  need  be  at  all  glad  to  have  this  question,  so  important  to  the 
public  and  ourselves,  debated  solely  on  the  ground  of  money. 
The  salary  in  any  business  under  heaven  is  not  the  only;  nor 
indeed  the  first,  question.    That  you  should  continue  to  exist  is 


J 


PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS,  1/7 

a  matter  for  your  own  consideration ;  but  that  your  business 
should  be  first  honest,  and  second  useful,  are  points  in  which 
honor  and  morality  are  concerned.  If  the  writer  to  whom  I 
refer  succeeds  in  persuading'  a  number  of  young  persons  to 
adopt  this  way  of  life  with  an  eye  set  singly  on  the  livelihood, 
we  must  expect  them  in  their  works  to  follow  profit  only,  and 
we  must  expect  in  consequence,  if  he  will  pardon  me  the  Epi- 
thets, a  slovenly,  base,  untrue,  and  empty  literature.  Of  that 
writer  himself  I  am  not  speaking;  he  is  diligent,  clean,  and 
pleasing;  we  all  owe  him  periods  of  entertainment,  and  he  has 
achieved  an  .amiable  popularity  which  he  has  adequately 
deserved.  But  the  truth  is,  he  does  not,  or  did  not  when  he 
first  embraced  it,  regard  his  profession  from  this  purely  merce- 
nary side.  He  w'ent  into  it,  I  sh^ll  venture  to  say,  if  not  with  any 
noble  design,  at  least  in  the  ardor  of  a  first  love;  and  he  enjoyed 
its  practice  long  before  he  paused  to  calculate  the  wage.  The 
other  day  an  author  was  complimented  on  a  piece  of  work,  good 
in  itself  and  exceptionally  good  for  him,  and  replied  in  terms 
unworthy  of  a  commercial  traveler,  that  as  the  book  was  not 
briskly  selling  he  did  not  give  a  copper  farthing  for  its  merit.  It 
must  not  be  supposed  that  the  person  to  whom  this  answer  was 
addreswied  received  it  as  a  profession  of  faith  ;  he  knew,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  it  was  only  a  whiff  of  irritation;  just  as  we 
know,  when  a  respectable  wrjter  talks  of  literature  as  a  way  of 
life,  like  shoemaking,  but  not  so  useful,  that  he  is  only  debating 
one  aspect  of  a  question,  and  is  still  clearly  conscious  of  a  dozen 
others  more  important  in  themselves  and  more  central  to  the 
matter  in  hand.  But  while  those  who  treat  literature  in  this 
penny-wise  and  virtue-foolish  spirit  are  themselves  truly  in  pos- 
session of  a  better  light,  it  does  not  follow  that  the  treatment  is 
decent  or  improving,  whether  for  themselves  or  others.  To 
treat  all  subjects  ^  in  the  highest,  the  most  honorable,  and  the 
pluckiest  spirit,  consistent  with  the  fact,  is  the  first  duty  of  the 
writer.  If  he  be  well  paid,  as  I  am  glad  to  hear  he  is,  this  duty 
becomes  the  more  urgent,  the  neglect  of  it  the  more  disgrace' 


178  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

And  perhaps  there  is  no  subject  on  which  a  man  should  speak 
so  gravely  as  that  industry,  whatever  it  may  be,  which  is  the  occu- 
pation or  delight  of  his  life  ;  which  is  his  tool  to  earn  or  serve 
with ;  and  which,  if  it  be  unworthy,  stamps  himself  as  a  mere 
incubus  of  dumb  and  greedy  bowels  on  the  shoulders  of  laboring 
humanity.  On  that  subject  alone  even  to  force  the  note  might 
lean  to  virtue*s  side.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  a  numerous  and 
enterprising  generation  of  writers  will  follow  and  surpass  the 
present  one ;  but  it  would  be  better  if  the  stream  were  stayed, 
and  the  roll  of  our  old.  honest.  English  books  were  closed,  than 
that  esurient  bookmakers  should  continue  and  debase  a  brave 
tradition  and  lower,  in  their  own  eyes,  a  famous  race.  Better 
that  our  serene  temples  were  deserted  than  filled  with  traflScking 
and  juggling  priests. 

There  are  two  just  reasons  for  the  choice  of  any  way  of  life : 
the  first  is  inbred  taste  in  the  chooser ;  the  second  some  high 
utility  in  the  industry  selected.  Literature,  like  any  other  art. 
is  singularly  interesting  to  the  artist ;  and  in  a  degree  p^uliar 
to  itself  among  the  arts,  it  is  useful  to  mankind.  These  are  the 
suflftcient  justifications  for  any  young  man  or  woman  who  adopts 
it  as  the  business  of  his  life.  1  shall  not  say  much  about  the 
wages.  A  writer  can  live  by  his  writing.  If  not  so  luxuriously 
as  by  other  trades,  then  less  luxuriously.  The  nature  of  the 
work  he  does  all  day  will  more  affect  his  happiness  than  the 
quality  of  his  dinner  at  night.  Whatever  be  your  calling,  and 
however  much  it  brings  you  in  the  year,  you  could  still,  you 
know,  get  more  by  cheating.  We  all  suffer  ourselves  to  be  too 
much  concerned  about  a  little  poverty;  but  such  considerations 
should  not  move  us  in  the  choice  of  that  which  is  to  be  the  bus- 
iness and  justification  of  so  great  a  portion  of  our  lives;  and  like 
the  missionary,  the  patriot,  or  the  philosopher,  we  should  all 
choose  that  poor  and  brave  career  in  which  we  can  do  the  most 
and  best  for  mankind.  Now  nature,  faithfully  followed,  proves 
herself  a  careful  mother.  A  lad,  for  some  liking  to  the  jingle  of 
■•vords,  betakes  himself  to  letters  for  his  life ;  by  and  by,  when  he 


t.  PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS.  179 

learns  more  gravity,  he  finds  that  he  has  chosen  better  than  he 
knew;  that  if  he  earns  little,  he  is  earning  it  amply;  that  if  he 
receives  a  small  wage,  he  is  in  a  position  to  do  considerable  ser- 
vices ;  that  it  is  in  his  power,  in  some  small  measure,  to  protect 
the  oppressed  and  to  defend  the  truth.  So  kindly  is  the  world 
arranged,  such  great  profit  may  arise  from  a  small  degree  of 
human  reliance  on  oneself,  and  such  in  particular  is  the  happy 
star  of  this  trade  of  writing,  that  it  should  combine  pleasure 
and  pi'ofit  to  both  parties,  and  be  at  once  agreeable,  like  fiddling, 
and  useful,  like  good  preaching. 

This  is  to  speak  of  literature  at  its  highest ;  and  with  the  four 
, great  elders  who  are^  still  spared  to  our  respect  and  admiration, 
with  Carlyle,  Ruskin,  Browning,  and  Tennyson  before  us,  it 
would  be  cowardly  to  consider  it  at  first  in  any  lesser  aspect.* 
But  while  we  cannot  follow  these  athletes,  while  we  may  none 
of  us,  perhaps,  be  very  vigorous,  very  original,  or  very  wise,  I 
still  contend  that,  in  the  humblest  sort  of  literary  work,  we  have 
it  in  our  power  either  to  do  great  harm  or  great  good.  We  may 
seek  merely  to  please ;  we  may  seek,  having  no  higher  gift, 
merely  to  gratify  the  idle  nine-days*  curiosity  of  our  contempo- 
raries ;  or  we  may  essay,  however  feebly,  to  instruct.  In  each  of 
these  we  shall  have  to  deal  with  that  remarkable  art  of  words 
which,  because  it  is  the  dialect  of  life,  comes  home  so  easily  and 
powerfully  to  the  minds  of  men ;  and  since  that  is  so,  we  con- 
tribute, in  each  of  these  branches,  to  build  up  the  sum  of  senti- 
ments and  appreciations  which  goes  by  the  name  of  Public 
Opinion  or  Public  Feeling.  The  total  of  a  nation's  reading,  in 
these  days  of  daily  papers,  greatly  modifies  the  total  of  the 
nation's  speech ;  and  the  speech  and  reading,  taken  together, 
form  the  efficient  educational  medium  of  youth.  A  good  man 
or  woman  may  keep  a  youth  some  little  while  in  clearer  air ; 
but  the  contemporary  atmosphere  is  all  powerful  in  the  end  on 
the  average  of  mediocre  characters.    The  copious  Corinthian 

*  Since  this  article  was  written,  only  three  of  these  remain.    But  the  other,  being 
dead,  yet.^>eaketh. 


l80  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

baseness  of  the  American  reporter  or  the  Parisian  chroiiiqueur, 
both  so  lightly  readable,  must  exercise  an  incalculable  influence 
for  ill ;  they  touch  upon  all  subjects,  and  on  all  with  the  same 
ungenerous  hand ;  they  begin  the  consideration  of  all,  in  young 
and  unprepared  minds,  in  an  unworthy  spirit ;  on  all  they  sup- 
ply some  pungency  for  dull  people  to  quote.  The  mere  body  of 
this  ugly  matter  overwhelms  the  rarer  utterances  of  good  men  ; 
the  sneering,  the  selfish,  and  the  cowardly  are  scattered  in  broad 
sheets  on  every  table,  while  the  antidote,  in  small  volumes,  lies 
unread  upon  the  shelf.  I  have  spoken  of  the  American  and  the 
French,  not  because  they  are  so  much  baser,  but  so  much  more 
readable  than  the  English ;  their  evil  is  done  more  effectively, 
in  America  for  the  masses,  in  French  for  the  few  that  care  to 
read ;  but  with  us  as  with  them,  the  duties  of  literature  are  daily- 
neglected,  truth  daily  perverted  and  suppressed,  and  grave  sub- 
jects daily  degraded  in  the  treatment.  The  journalist  is  not 
reckoned  an  important  officer ;  yet  judge  of  the  good  he  might 
do,  the  harm  he. does;  judge  of  it  by  one  instance  only:  that 
when  we  find  two  journals  on  the  reverse  sides  of  politics  each 
on  the  same  day  openly  garbling  a  piece  of  news  for  the  interest 
of  its  own  party,  we  smile  at  the  discovery  (no  discovery  now!) 
as  over  a  good  joke  arid  pardonable  stratagem.  Lying  so  open  ^ 
is  scarce  lying,  it  is  true ;  but  one  of  the  things  that  we  profess 
to  teach  our  young  is  a  respect  for  truth;  and  I  cannot  think 
this  piece  of  education  will  be  crowned  with  any  great  success, 
so  long  as  some  of  us  practice  and  the  rest  openly  approve  of 
public  falsehood. 

There  are  two  duties  incumbent  upon  any  man  who  enters 
on  the  business  of  writing :  truth  to  the  fact  and  a  good  spirit 
in  the  treatment.  In  every  department  of  literature,  though  so 
low  as  hardly  to  deserve  the  name,  truth  to  the  fact  is  of  im- 
portance to  the  education  and  comfort  of  mankind,  and  so  hard 
to  preserve,  that  the  faithful  trying  to  do  so  will  lend  some  dig- 
nity to  the  man  who  tries  it.  Our  judgments  are  based  upon 
two  things :  first,  upon  the  original  preferences  of  our  soul ;  but. 


PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS,  iSl  ' 

second,  upon  the  mass  of  testimony  to  the  nature  of  God,  man, 
and  the  universe  which  reaches  us,  in  divers  manners,  from 
without.  For  the  most  part  these  divers  manners  are  reducible 
to  one,  all  that  we  learn  of  past  times  and  much  that  we  learn  of 
our  own  reaching  us  through  the  medium  of  books  or  papers, 
and  even  he  who  cannot  read  learning^  from  the  same  source  at 
second  hand  and  by  the  report  of  him  who  can.  Thus  the  sum 
of  the  contemporary  knowledge  or  ignorance  of  good  and  evil 
is,  in  large  measure,  the  handiwork  of  those  who  write.  Those 
who  write  have  to  see  that  each  man's  knowledge  is,  as  near  as 
they  can  make  it,  answerable  to  the  facts  of  life  ;  that  he  shall 
not  suppose  himself  an  angel  or  a  monster ;  nor  take  this  world 
for  a  hell ;  nor  be  suffered  to  imagine  that  all  rights  are  con- 
centered in  his  own  caste  or  country,  or  all  veracities  in  his  own 
parochial  creed.  Each  man  should  learn  what  is  within  him, 
that  he  may  strive  to  mend ;  he  must  be  taught  what  is  without 
htm,  that  he  may  be  kind  to  others.  It  can  never  be  wrong  to 
tell  him  the  truth;  for,  in  his  disreputable  state,  weaving  as  he 
goes  his  theory  of  life,  steering  himself,  cheering  or  reproving 
others,  all  facts  are  of  the  first  importance  to  his  conduct ;  and 
even  if  a  fact  shall  discourage  or  corrupt  him,  it  is  still  best 
that  he  should  know  it ;  for  it  is  in  this  world  as  it  is,  and  not 
in  a  world  made  easy  by  educational  suppressions,  that  he  must 
win  his  way  to  shame  or  glory.  In  one  word,  it  must  always  be 
foul  to  tell  what  is  false ;  and  it  can  never  be  safe  to  suppress 
what  is  true.  The  very  fact  that  you  omit  may  be  what  some- 
body was  wanting,  for  one  man's  meat  is  another  man's  poison, 
and  I  have  known  a  person  who  was  cheered  by  tTKe  perusal  of 
"Candide."  Every  fact  is  a  part  of  that  great  puzzle  we  must 
set  together;  and  none  that  comes  directly  in  a  writer  s  path  but 
has  some  nice  relations,  unperceivable  by  him,  to  the  totality 
and  bearing  of  the  subject  under  hand.  Yet  there,  are  certain 
classes  of  fact  eternally  more  necessary  than  others,  and  it  is 
with  these  that  literature  must  first  bestir  itself.  They  are  not 
hard  to  distinguish,  nature  once  more  easily  leading  us ;  for  the 


1 82  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

necessary,  because  the  efficacious,  facts  are  those  which  are  mort 
interesting  to  the  natural  mind  of  man.  Those  which  are 
colored,  picturesque,  human,  and  rooted  in  morality,  and  those, 
on  the  other  hand,  which  are  clear,  indisputable,  and  a  part  of 
science,  are  alone  vital  in  jmportance,  seizing  by  their  interest, 
or  useful  to  communicate.  So  far  as  the  wtiter  merel)'  narrates, 
he  should  principally  tell  of  these.  He  should  tell  of  the  kind 
and  wholesome  and  beautiful  elements  of  our  life ;  he  should 
tel]  unsparingly  of  the  evil  and  sorrow  of  the  present,  to  move 
us  with  instances ;  he  shouki  tell  of  wise  and  good  people  in  the 
past*  to  excite  us  by  example ;  and  of  these  he  should  tell  soberly- 
and  truthfully,  not  glossing  faults,  that  we  may  neither  grow 
discouraged  with  ourselves  nor  exacting  to  our  neighbors.  So 
the  body  of  contemporary  literature,  ephemeral  and  feeble  in 
itself,  touches  in  the  minds  of  men  the  springs  of  thought  and 
kindness,  and  supports  them  (for  those  who  will  go  at  all  are 
easily  supported)  on  their  way  to  what  is  true  and  right.  And 
if,  in  any  degree,  it  does  so  now,  how  much  more  might  it  do  so 
if  the  writers  chose !  There  is  not  a  life  in  all  the  records  of  the 
past  but,  properly  studied,  might  lend  a  hint  and  a  help  to  some 
contemporary.  There  is  not  a.  juncture  in  to-day's  affairs  but 
some  useful  word  may  yet  be  said  of  it.  Even  the  reporter  has 
an  office,  and,  with  clear  eyes  and  honest  language,  may  unveil 
injustices  and  point  the  way  to  progress.  And  for  a  last  word : 
in  all  narration  there  is  only  one  way  to  be  clever,  and  that  is  to 
be  exact.  To  be  vivid  is  a  secondary  quality  which  must  pre- 
suppose the  first ;  for  vividly  to  convey  a  wrong  impression  is 
only  to  make  failure  conspicuous. 

But  a  fact  may  be  viewed  on  many  sides ;  it  may  be  chronicled 
with  rage,  tears,  laughter,  indifference,  or  admiration,  and  by 
each  of  these  the  story  will  be  transformed  to  something  else. 
The  newspapers  that  told  of  the  return  of  our  representatives 
from  Berlin,  even  if  they  had  not  differed  as  to  the  facts,  would 
have  sufficiently  differed  by  their  spirit ;  so  that  the  one  descrip- 
tion would  have  been  a  second  ovation,  and  the  other  a  pro- 


'      PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS,  I83 

loaged  insult.  The  subject  makes  but  a  trifling  part  of  any  piece 
of  literature,  and  the  view  of  the  writer  is  itself  a  fact  more  im- 
portant because  less  disputable  than  the  others.  Now  this  spirit 
in  which  a  subject  is  regarded,  important  in  all  kinds  of  literary 
work,  becomes  all  important  in  works  of  fiction,  meditation,  or 
rhapsody  J  for  there  it  not  only  colors  but  itself  chooses  the 
facts ;  not  only  modifies  but  shapes  the  work.  And  hence,  over 
the  far  larger  proportion  of  the  field  of  literature,  the  health  or 
disease  6f  the  writer's  mind  or  momentary  humor  forms  not 
only  the  leading  feature  of  his  work,,  but  is,  at  bottom,  the  only 
thing  he  can  communicate  to  others.  In  all  works  of  art,  widely 
speaking,  it  is  first  of  all  the  author's  attitude  that  is  narrated^ 
though  in  the  attitude  there  be  implied  a  whole  experience  and 
a  theory  of  life.  An  author  who  has  begged  the  question  and 
reposes  in  some  narrow  faith»  cannot,^if  he  would,  express  the 
whole  or  even  many  of  the  sides  of  this  various  existence ;  for 
his  own  life  being  maim,  some  of  them  are  not  admitted  in  his 
theory,  and  were  only  dimly  and  unwillingly  recognized  in  his 
experience.  Hence  the  smallness,  the  triteness,  and  the  inhu- 
manity in  works  of  merely  sectarian  religion ;  and  hence  we  find 
equal  although  unsimilar  limitations  in  works  inspired  by  the 
spirit  of  the  flesh  or  the  despicable  taste  for  high  society.  So 
that  the  first  duty  of  any  man  who  is  to  write  is  intellectual. 
Designedly  or  not,  he  has  so  far  set  himself  up  for  a  leader  of 
the  minds  of  men  ;  and  he  must  see  that  his  own  mind  is  kept 
supple,  charitable,  and  bright.  Everything  but  prejudice  should 
find  a, voice  through  him ;  he  should  see  the  good  in  all  things; 
where  he  has  even  a  fear  that  he  does  not  wholly  understand, 
there  he  should  be  wholly  silent ;  and  he  should  recognize  from 
the  first  that  he  has  only  one  tool  in  his  workshop,  and  that  tool 
is  sympathy.* 

*  A  foot-note,  at  least,  is  due  to  the  admirable  example  set  before  all  young  writers 
m  the  width  of  literary  sympathy  displayed  by  Mr.  Swinburne.  He  runs  forth  to 
welcome  merit,  whether  in  Dickens  or  Trollopc,  whether  in  Villon,  Milton,  or  Pope. 
This  is,  in  criticism,  the  attitude  we  should  all  seek  to  preserve,  not  only  in  that,  but 
m  every  branch  of  literary  \rork. 


184  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

The  second  duty,  far  harder  to  define,  is  moral.  There  are  a 
thousand  different  humors  in  the  mind,  and  about  each  of  them, 
when  it  is  uppet-most,  some  literature  tends  to  be  deposited.  Is 
this  to  be  allowed  ?  not  certainly  in  every  case,  and  yet  perhaps 
in  more  than  rigorists  would  fancy.  It  were  to  be  desired  that 
all  literary  work,  and  chiefly  works  of  art,  issued  from  sound, 
human,  healthy,  and  potent  impulses,  whether  grave  or  laugh- 
ing, humorous,  romantic,  or  religious.  Yet  it  cannot  be  denied 
that  some  valuable  books  are  partially  insane ;  some,  mostly 
religious,  partially  inhuman ;  and  very  many  tainted  with  mor- 
bidity and  impotence.  We  do  not  loathe  a  masterpiece  although 
we  gird  against  its  blemishes.  We  are  not,  above  all,  to  look 
for  faults  but  merits.  There  is  no  book  perfect,  even  in  design  ; 
but  there  are  many  that  will  delight,  irnpfove,  or  encourage  the 
reader.  On  the  one  hand,  the  Hebrew  I^salms  are  the  only 
religious  poetry  on  earth ;  yet  they  contain  sallies  that  savor 
rankly  of  the  man  of  blood.  On  the  other  hand,  Alfred  de 
Musset  had  a  poisoned  and  a  contorted  nature;  I  am  only- 
quoting  that  generous  and  frivolous  giaiit,  old  Dumas,'  when  I 
acfcuse  him  of  a  bad  heart ;  yet,  when  the  impulse  under  which 
he  wrote  was  purely  creative,  he  Could  give  us  works  like  "  Car- 
mosine"  or  "  Fantasio."  In'wliich  the  lost  llote  of  the  romantic 
comedy  seems  to  have  been  found  again  to  touch  and  please  us. 
When  Flaubert  wrote  "  Madame  BoVary,"  I  believe  he  thought 
chiefly  of  a  somewhat  morbid  realism  ;  and  behold  f  the  t>ook 
turned  in  his  hands  into  a  masterpiece  of  appalling  morality. 
But  the  truth  is.  when  books  are  conceived  under  a  great  stress, 
with  a  soul  of  nine-fold  power  nine  times  heated  and  electrified 
by  effort,  the  conditions  of  our  being  are  seized  with  such  an 
ample  grasp,  that,  even  should  the  main  design  be  trivial  or 
base,  some  truth  and  beauty  cannot  fail  to  be  expressed.  Out 
of  the  strong  comes  forth  sweetness ;  but  an  ill  thing  poorly 
done  is  an  ill  thing  top  and  bottom.  And  §o  this  can  be  no 
encouragement   to  knock-kneed,   feeble-wristed    scribes,  who 


PROFESSION  OF  LETTERS,  1 85 

must  take  their  business  conscientiously  or  be  ashamed  to  prac- 
tice it. 

Man- is  imp)erfect;  ye^  in  his  literature  he  must  express  him- 
self and  his  own  views  and  preferences ;  for  to  do  anything  else 
is  to  do  a  far  more  ^perilous  thing  than  to  risk  being  immoral : 
it  is  to  be  sure  of  being  untrue.  To  ape  a  sentiment,  even  a 
good  one,  is  to  travesty  a  sentiment ;  that  will  not  be  helpful. 
To  conceal  a  sentiment,  if  you  are  sure  you  hold  it,  is  to  take  a 
liberty  with  truth.  There  is  probably  no  point  of  view  possible 
to  a  sane  man  but  contains  some  truth  and,  in  the  true  connec- 
tion, might  be  profitable  to  the  race.  I  am  not  afraid  of  the 
truth,  if  any  one  could  tell  it  me,  but  I  am  afraid  of  parts  of  it 
impertinently  uttered.  ^  There  is  a  time  to  dance  and  a  time  to 
mourn  ;  to  be  harsh  as  well  as  to  be  sentimental ;  to  be  ascetic  as 
well  as  to  glorify  the  appetites  ;  and  if  a  man  were  to  combine  all 
these  extremes  into  his  work,  each  in  its  place  and  proportion, 
that  work  would  be  the  world's  masterpiece  of  morality  as  well 
as  of  art.  Partiality  is  immorality ;  for  any  book  is  wrong  that 
gives  a  misleading  picture  of  the  world  and  life.  The  trouble  is 
that  the  weakling  must  be  partial;  the  work  of  one  proving 
dank  and  depressing;  of  another,  cheap  and  vulgar;  of  a  third, 
epileptically  sensual ;  of  a  fourth,  sourly  ascetic.  In  literature, 
as  in  conduct,  you  can  never  hope  to  do  exactly  right.  All  you 
can  do  is  to  make  as  sure  as  possible ;  and  for  that  there  is  but 
one  rule.  Nothing  should  be  done  in  a  hurry  that  can  be  done 
slowly.  It  is  no  use  to  write  a  book  and  put  it  by  for  nine  or 
even  ninety  years  ;  for  in  the  writing  you  will  have  partly  con- 
vinced yourself;  the  delay  must  precede  any  beginning ;  and  if 
you  meditate  a  work  of  art,  you  should  first  long  roll  the  sub- 
ject under  the  tongue  to  make  sure  you  like  the  flavor,  before 
you  brew  a  volume  that  shall  taste  of  it  from  end  to  end  ;  or  if 
you  propose  to  enter  on  the  field  of  controversy,  you  should  first 
have  thought  upon  the  question  under  all  conditions,  in  health 
as  well  as  in  sickness,  in  sorrow  as  well  as  in  joy.     It  is  this 


1 86  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,    ^  ' 

nearness  of  examination  necessary  for  any  true  and  kind  writing, 
that  makes  the  practice  of  the  art  a  prolonged  and  noble  educa- 
tion fpr  the  writer. 

There  is  plenty  to  do,  plenty  to  say,  or  to  say  over  again,  in 
the  meantime.  Any  literary  work  which  conveys  faithful  facts 
or  pleasing  impressions  is  a  service  to  the  public.  It  is  even  a 
service  to  be  thankfully  proud  of  having  rendered.  The  slightest 
novels  are  a  blessing  to  those  in  distress,  not  chloroform  itself  a 
greater.  Our  fine  old  sea-captain's  life  was  justified  when  Car- 
lyle  soothed  his  mind  with  "The  King's  Own"  or  "Newton 
Forster."  To  please  is  to  serve ;  and  so  far  from  its  being  diffi- 
cult to  instruct  while  you  amuse,  it  is  difficult  to  do  the  one 
thoroughly  without  the  other.  Some  part  of  the  writer  or  his 
life  will  crop  out  in  even  a  vapid  book ;  and  to  read  a  novel  that 
'  was  conceived  with  any  force,  is  to  multiply  experience  and  to 
exercise  the  sympathies.  Every  article,  every  piece  of  verse, 
every  essay,  every  entre-filet,  is  destined  to  pass,  however 
swiftly,  through  the  minds  of  some  portion  of  the  public  and  to 
color,  however  transiently,  their  thoughts.  When  any  subject 
falls  to  be  discussed,  some  scribbler  on  a  paper  has  the  invalu- 
able opportunity  of  beginning  its  discussion  in  a  dignified  and 
human  spirit ;  and  if  there  were  enough  who  did  so  in  our  public 
press,  neither  the  public  nor  the  parliament  would  find  it  in  their 
minds  to  drop  to  meaner  thoughts.  The  writer  has  the  chance 
to  stumble,  by  the  way,  on  something  pleasing,  something  inter- 
esting, something  encouraging,  were  it  only- to  a  single  reader. 
He  will  be  unfortunate,  indeed,  if  he  suit  no  one.  He  has  the 
chance,  besides,  to  stumble  on  something  that  a  dull  person 
shall  be  able  to  comprehend ;  and  for  a  dull  person  to  have  read 
anything  and,  for  that  once,  comprehended  it,  makes  a  marking 
epoch  in  his  education. 

Here  then  is  work  worth  doing  and  worth  trying  to  do  well. 
And  so,  if  I  were  minded  to  welcome  any  great  accession  to  our 
trade,  it  should  not  be  from  any  reason  of  a  higher  wage,  but 
because  it  was  a  trade  which  was  useful  in  a  very  great  and  in  a 


i 


THOMAS  CARLYLE,  1 8/ 

very  high  degree;  which  every  honest  tradesman  could  make 
more  serviceable  to  mankind  in  his  single  strength  ;  which  was 
difficult  to  do  well  and  possible  to  do  better  every  year;  which 
called  for  scrupulous  thought  on  the  part  of  all  who  practiced  it, 
and  hence  became  a  perpetual  education  to  their  nobler  natures ; 
and  which,  pay  it  as  you  please,  in  the  large  majority  of  the  best 
cases  will  still  be  underpaid.  For  surely,  at  this  time  of  day  in 
the  nineteenth  century,  there  is  nothing  that  an  honest  man 
should  fear  more  timorously  than  getting  and  spending  more 
than  he  deserves. 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  in  The  Fortnightly  Review. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

Those  who  from  however  great  a  distance  have  shared  in  the 
long  vigil  held  in  that  **  little  house  at  Chelsea,"  of  which  so 
much  has  been  heard  and  said  in  recent  days,  must  have  felt  it 
something  like  a. personal  relief  and  solemn  satisfaction  when 
the  last  bonds  were  loosened,  and  the  old  man,  so  weary  and 
worn  with  living,  was  delivered  from  his  earthly  troubles.  *'  They 
will  not  understand  that  it's  death  I  want/'  he  said  one  of  the 
last  times  I  saw  him.  He  said  the  same  thing  to  all  his  visitors. 
As  he  sat,  gaunt  and  tremulpus,  in  the  middle  of  the  quiet, 
graceful  little  room,  with  still  a  faint  perfume  about  it  of  his  wife 
and  her  ways,  still  so  like  himself,  talking  in  the  cadenced  and 
rhythmic  tones  of  his  native  dialect,  which  suited  so  well  the 
natural  form  of  his  diction,  with  now  and  then  an  abrupt  out- 
burst of  that  broken  laugh  which  is  so  often  only  another  form 
of  weeping,-weariness  had  entered  into  his  soul.  Great  weak- 
ness was  no  doubt  one  of  its  chief  causes ;  but  also  the  loneli- 
ness of  the  heart,  the  solitude  of  one  whose  companion  had  gone 
from  his  side,  and  who,  though  surrounded  by  tender  friends 


l88  .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and  loving  service,  had  no  one  of  the  primary  relationships  left 
to  him,  nothing  of  his  very  own  still  remaining  out  of  the  wrecks 
of  life.  His  course  was  over  years  ago — nothing  left  for  him 
to  do,  no  reason  for  living  except  the  fact  that  he  was  left  thercfj 
and  could  do  no  other.  It  is  scarcely  too  much  to  say  that  the 
whole  nation,  in  which  nevertheless  there  are  so  many  to  whom 
he  was  but  a  name,  attended  him,  with  uncovered  head,  and 
unfeigned  reverence,  to  the  little  churchyard  in  Annandale  where 
he  is  gathered  to  his  fathers.  No  one  now  living  perhaps,  apart 
from  the  warmer  passion  of  politics,  on  the' ground  of  mere  liter- 
ary- fame,  would  call  forth  so  universal  a  recogriition — certainly 
no  one  whose  voice  had  been  silent  and  his  visible  presence 
departed  for  so  long  before  the  actual  ending  of  his  pilgrimage* 
It  is  possible  that  any  disturbance  so  soon  of  the  religious 
calm  and  subduing  influence  of  that  last  scene  would  have 
seemed  harsh  and  unseasonable ;  but  there  is  more  than  any  mere 
sentimental  objection  to  the  immediate  awakening  of  contend- 
ing voices  over  the  Master's  grave,  in  the  feeling  with  which  we 
regard  the  book  which  has  been  so  hurriedly  placed  in  our 
handsr— the  last  utterance  of  the  last  prophet  and  sage,  what 
should  have  been  the  legacy  of  ripest  wisdom,  and  calm  at  least, 
if  not  benignant  philosophy.  That  Carlyle  was  not  one  who 
regarded  contemporary  progress  with  satisfaction,  or  had  any 
optimist  views  about  the  improvement  of  the  world,  we  were  all 
well  aware.  But  never  had  his  great  spirit  stooped  to  individ- 
ual contention,  to  anything  that  could  be  called  unkindness;  and 
we  had  no  reason  to  expect  that  any  honest  and  friendly  con- 
temporary on  opening  this  posthumous  record  should  receive  a 
sting.  But  now  the  book,  so  long  mysteriously  talked  of,  and 
to  which  we  have  looked  as,  when  it  should  come,  one  of  the 
most  touching  and  impressive  of  utterances,  has  burst  upon  the 
world  like  a  missile,  an  angry  meteor,  rather  than  with  the'  still 
shl  tii  njT  as  of  a  star  in  the  firmament  which  we  had  looked  for.  The 
effect  would  scarcely  have  been  more  astonishing  if,  after  having 
'■^id  down  that  noble  and  mournful  figure  to  his  everlasting  rest, 

\  .::^ 


THOMAS  CARLYLE,  1 89 

he  had  risen  again  to  pour  forth  an  outburst  of  angry  words 
upon  us.  Had  we  been  less  near  the  solemn  conclusion,  per- 
haps the  shock  and  surprise  would  have  been  less  painful ;  and  it 
is  possible,  as  some  one  says,  that  "  a  hundred  years  hence  peo- 
ple will  read  it  with  the  same  interest."  But  this  has  little  to  do 
with  the  immediate  question,  which  is  that  this  record  of  so 
much  of  his  life  reveals  to  us  a  far  less  impressive  and  dignified 
personality  than  that  which — in  the  reverential  myths  and 
legends  of  the  gods  of  which  Carlyle  in  his  old  age  has  been  so 
long  the  subject — his  generation  has  attributed  to  him.  It  is 
hard  to  contend  against  the  evidence  supplied  by  his  own  hand, 
and  it  will  be  very  difficult  to  convince  the  world  that  we  who 
think  differently  of  him  knew  better  than  himself.  Neverthe- 
less, there  will  no  doubt  be  many  eager  to  undertake  this  for- 
lorn hope,  and  vindicate  the  character  he  has  aspersed.   . 

It  is  scarcely  possible  that  there  should  not  be  an  outcry  of 
derision  at  such  an  idea.  Who,  the  reader  will  say,  could  know 
him  so  well  as  himself.^ — which  is  unanswerable,  yet  a  fallacy,  so 
far  as  I  can  judge.  No  one  has  ever  set  a  historical  figure  so  viv- 
idly before  us,  with  dauntless  acceptance  of  its  difficulties,  and 
bold  and  strong  presentment  of  an  individual,  be  he  the  real 
Cromwell  or  Frederick  or  not,  yet  an  actual  and  living  Some- 
body not  unworthy  (if  not  perhaps  too  worthy)  of  the  name. 
But  in  this  latest  work  of  all,  where  lie  has  to  deal  not  with 
historical  figfures  but  with  those  nearest  and  most  dear  to 
himself,  I  venture  to  think,  with  respect,  that  Carlyle  has  failed, 
not  only  in  the  drawing  of  himself  (made  in  one  sad  and  fevered 
mood)  but  also  of  those  in  whom  he  was  most  deeply  interested 
and  ought  to  have  known  best.  Nothing  can  prove  more  cu- 
riously the  inadequacy  of  personal  impressions  and  highly 
wrought  feeling  to  reach  that  truth  of  portraiture  which  the 
hand  of  an  unconcerned  spectator  will  sometimes  lightly  attain. 
The  only  figure  in  this  strange  and  unhappy  book  which  has 
real  life  in  it,  and  stands  detached  all  round  from  the  troubled 
background,  is  that  of  the  man  who  was  least  to  the  writer  of 


IQd  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA GAZINE. 

all  the  group,  most  unlike  him,  the  vivacious,  clear-heacled,  suc- 
cessful, and  brilliant  Jeffrey,  a  man  in  respect  to  whom  there 
was  no  passionate  feeling  in  his  mind,  neither  love,  nor  com- 
punction, nor  indignant  sympathy,  nor  tender  self-identification. 
The  sketch  of  James  Carlyle,  which  for  some  time  has  been 
talked  about  in  literary  circles,  with  bated  breath,  and  which 
critics  in  general,  confused  and  doubtful  of  their  own  opinion, 
have  turned  to  as  the  one  thing  exquisite  in  these  reminiscences, 
is  after  all  not  a  portrait  but  a  panegyric — a  strange  outpouring 
of  love  and  grief,  in  which  the  writer  seems  half  to  chant  his 
own  funeral  oration  with  that  of  his  father,  and  enters  into  every 
particular  of  character  with  such  a  sense  of  sharing  it,  and  into 
the  valley  and  shadow  of  death  with  such  a  reflection  of  solem- 
nity and  awe  and  the  mystery  of  departure  upon  his  own  head, 
thai  our  interest  is  awakened  much  more  strongly  for  him,  than 
by  any  distinct  perception  we  have  of  his  predecessor.  It  is 
impossible  not  to  be  touched  and  impressed  by  this  duality  of 
being,  this  tremulous  solemn  absorption  of  self  in  the  shadowy- 
resemblance  ;  but  the  real  man  whom  we  are  supposed  to  be 
contemplating,  shapes  very  confusedly  through  those  mists. 
This  sketch,  too,  was  made  in  the  immediate  shock  of  loss,  while 
yet  the  relations  of  the  dead  to  ourselves  are  most  clear,  strength- 
ened rather  than  diminished  by  their  withdrawal  out  of  our  sight. 
At  such  a  moment  it  would  be  strange  indeed  if  the  light  were 
clear  enough  and  the  hand  steady  enough  to  give  due  firmness 
to  the  outline.  That  good  craftsman,  that  noble  peasant,  looms 
out  of  those  mists  a  hero  and  prophet  like  those  reflections  upon 
the  mountains  which  turn  a  common  figure  into  that  of  a  giant. 
A  tear  is  as  effectual  in  this  way  as  all  the  vapors  of  the  Alps. 
LooTcing  back  through  this  haze  it  is  no  wonder  that  the  gifted 
son  with  all  the  reverential  recollections  of  his  childhood  roused 
and  quickened,  should  see  the  figures  of  his  kindred  and  ances* 
tors,  his  father  chief  of  all,  like  patriarchs  in  the  country  which 
in  his  consciousness  had  produced  nothing  nobler.  "They  were 
«>mong  the  best  and  truest  men  (perhaps  the  very  best)  in  their 


THOMAS  CARLYLE.  I9I 

district  and  craft,"  they  were  men  of  "evidently  rather  peculiar 
endowmeat."  The  father  was  "one  of  the  most  interesting  men 
I  have  ever  known,"  "  the  pleasantest  man  I  had  to  speak  with 
in  all  Scotland,"  "  a  man  of  perhaps  the  very  largest  natural 
endowment  of  any  it  has  been  my  lot  to  converse  with." 

All  this  is  very  touching  to  read ;  and  it  is  infinitely  interest- 
ing and  fine  to  see  a  man  so  gifted,  whose  genius  has  given  him 
access  out  of  the  lowliest  to  the  highest  class  of  his  contempora- 
ries, thus  turning  back  with  grateful  admiration  and  love  to  the 
humble  yet  noble  stock  from  which  he  sprang.  But  with  all 
this  it  is  not  a  portrait,  nor  are  we  much  thewi^er  as  to  the  indi- 
vidual portrayed.  "  I  call  him  a  natural  man,  singularly  free 
from  all  manner  of  affectation,"  Carlyle  proceeds,  as  if  the  chil- 
dren and  the  friends  were  all  met  together  to  render  honor  to  the 
dead,and  could  respond  out  of  their  own  experience  with  emphatic 
"  Ayes  !"  with  sympathetic  shakings  of  the  head,  "  he  was  among 
the  best  of  the  true  men  which  Scotland  on  the  old  system  pro- 
duced or  can  produce ;  a  man  liealthy  in  body  and  mind,  fearing 
God  and  diligently  working  on  God's  earth  with  contented  hope 
and  unwearied  resolution."  It  is  an  eloquent  eloge,  like  those 
which  in  France  are  pronounced  over  the  grave  in  the  hearing 
of  friends  specially  qualified  to  assent,  and  to  confirm  the  truth. 
But  at  the  very  highest  that  can  be  said  of  it  this  is  description 
merely,  and  James  Carlyle  never  stands  before  us — let  us  not 
say  as  Cromwell  does,  but  even  like  Father  Andreas  in  "  Sartor 
Resartus,"  who  was  partly,  no  doubt,  drawn  from  him,  and  who 
with  half  the  pains  comes  out  before  us  a  veritable  man.* 

♦  The  diflference  between  this  descriptive  treatment  and  distinct  portraiture  could 
scarcely  be  better  shown  than  by  the  following  delightful  story  recalled  to  me  by  a 
noble  lady,  an  older  friend  than  myself,  as  told  by  Mrs.  Carlyle  of  her  father-in-law. 
When  they  met  after  her  marriage,  she  offered  him  a  filial  kiss,  which  the  old  man 
felt  to  be  too  great  an  honor.  *'  Na,  na,  Mistress  Jean,"  he  said,  too  respectful  of 
his  son's  lady-wife  to  call  her  bluntly  by  her  Christian  name, "  I'm  no  fit  to  kiss  the  ' 
like  of  you.'*— *' Hoot,  James,"  his  wife  cried,  distrecsed  by  the  rudeness,  though 
not  without  her  share  in  the  feeling,  **  you'll  no  refuse  her  when  it's  her  pleasure." 
•*  Na,  na,"  repeated  old  Carlyle,  softly  putting  away  the  pretty  young  gentlewoman 
irith  his  hand.    He  disappeared  for  some  time  after  this,  then  returned,  clean- 


192  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

This  IS  true  also  I  think,  with  the  exception  already  noted,  of 
all  we  have  in  these  volumes.  There  are  facts  and  incidents 
which  no  man  but  he  could  have  reported — some  of  great  inter- 
est, some,  as  was  inevitable,  of  no  interest  at  all — but  he  whose 
power  of  pictorial  representation  was  so  great,  has  not  been  able 
to  make  either  his  dear  friend  or  dearest  wife  a  living  image  to 
our  eyes.  For  this  purpose,  an  imagination  not  limited  by  de- 
tails so  well  remembered,  a  mind  more  free,  a  heart  less  deeply 
engaged  was  necessary.  It  is  not  in  nature  that  we  should  look 
upon  the  figures  which  walk  by  our  side  through  life,  and  share 
every  variety  of  our  existence,  as  we  behold  others  more  distant. 
Carlyle  had  neither  the  cold  blood  nor  the  deliberate  purpose 
which  would  have  made  such  a  piece  of  intellectual  vivisection 
possible.  Goethe  could  do  it,  but  not  the  enthusiast  who  fixed 
his  worship  upon  that  heathen  demi-god,  the  being  of  all  others 
most  unlike  himself  in  all  the  lists  of  fame.  It  is  hard  to  under- 
stand why  Carlyle  took  Irving  in  hand  at  all.  It  was  in  the  heat 
and  urgency  of  troubled  thoughts,  when  his  wife's  death  had 
stirred  up  all  the  ancient  depths,  and  carried  him  back  to  his 
youth  and  all  his  associations :  and  many  a  beautiful  stretch  of 
that  youth,  of  walks  and  talks,  of  poetic  wanderings,  of  dreams 
and  musings  which  we  should  have  been  sorry  to  lose,  is  to  be 
found  in  the  long  and  discursive  chapter  of  recollections  v/hich 
he  has  inscribed  with  his  friend's  name ;'  but  of  Irving  little,  not 
much  more  than  a  silhouette  of  him,  dark  against  the  clear  back- 
ground of  those  spring  skies.  It  may  perhaps  be  supposed  that 
I  am  scarcely  likely  to  touch  upon  this  subject  without  bias ; 
but  I  do  not  think  there  was  the  slightest  unwillingness  in  my 
mind  to  receive  a  new  light  upon  it,  nor  any  anticipation  of  hos- 
tility in  the  eagerness  with  which  I  turned  over  those  pages 

shaven  and  in  his  best  Sunday  clothes,  blue  coat,  most  likely  with  metal  buttons, 
and  all  his  rustic  bravery,  and  approached  her  with  a  smile.    *'  If  you'll  give  me  a 
kiss  now  !'*  he  said. 
Could  there  be  a  more  delightful  instance  of  the  most  chivalrous  delicacy  of  feeK 
-^  ?    It  is  worth  a  whole  volume  of  panegyric. 


L. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE.  I93 

coming  from  the  hand  of  a  beloved  Master,  as  much  nearer  to 
Edward  Irving  as  he  was  superior  to  any  of  us.  But  here,  save 
by  glimpses,  and  those  mostly  of  the  silhouette  kind  as  has  been 
said,  is  no  Irving.  There  is  but  a  vague  'comrade  of  Carlyle's 
youth,  mostly  seen  on  his  outer  side,  little  revealing  any  passion, 
prophetic  or  otherwise,  in  him,  a  genial  stalwart  companion,  of 
whom  the  writer  is  unwilling  to  allow  even  so  much  as  that  the 
li^ht  which  led  him  astray  was  light  from  heaven.  And  yet  it  is 
with  no  petty  intention  of  pulling  down  from  its  elevation  the 
figure  of  his  friend  that  this  is  done,  but  rather  to  vindicate  him 
as  far  as  possible  from  the  folly  with  which  he  threw  himself  into 
what  was  nothing  but  wretched  imposture  and  hysterical  shriek- 
ing and  noise  to  the  other.  Rather  that  it  should  be  made  out 
to  be  mere  excitement,  the  ever-quickening  tide  of  a  current 
from,  which  the  victim  could  not  escape,  than  that  any  possibil- 
ity of  consideration  should  be  awarded  to  those  strange  spiritual 
influences  which  swayed  him.  But  not  to  enter  into  this  ques- 
tion, upon  which  it  wac  natural  that  there  should  be  no  mutual 
comprehension  between  the  friends,  we  think  the  reader  will 
make  very  little  of  the  man  who  occupies  nominally  the  greater 
part  of  one  of  these  volumes.  His  open-air  aspect,  his  happy 
advent  when  became  on  his  early  visits  to  Annandale, giving  to 
Carlyle  delightsome  openings  out  of  his  little  farm-house  circle, 
aflford  a  succession  of  breezy  sketches ;  and  we  see  with  pleasure 
the  two  young  men  strolling  along  "the  three  miles  down  that 
bonny  river  s  bank,  no  sound  but  our  own  voices  amid  the  lul- 
laby of  waters  and  the  twittering  of  birds  ;'*  or  sitting  together 
among  the  "  peat-hags"  of  Drumclog  Moss  "  under  the  silent 
bright  skies."  All  these  are  pictures  "  pretty  to  see,"  as  Carlyle 
says.  But  there  is  no  growing  of  acquaintance  with  this  big 
friendly  figure,  and  when  we  see  him  in  London,  always  against 
a  background  more  distinct  than  himself,  though  no  longer  now 
of  "  bright  silent  skies,"  but  of  hot  interiors  full  of  crowding 
faces,  mostly  (alas  for  the  careless  record  made  in  an  unhappy 
monient !)  represented  as  of  the  'ignoble  sort — it  is  less  and  less 
L.  M.  8.-7 


194  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

possible  to  identify  him,  or  make  out,  except  that  he  is  always 
true  and  noble,  amid  every  kind  of  pettiness  and  social  vxilgar- 
ity,  what  manner  of  man  he  was.  This  difficulty  is  increased  by 
the  continual  crossing  and  re-crossing  of  Carlyle  himself  over 
the  space  nominally  consecrated  to  Irving,  sometimes  strikirjg 
him  out  altogether,  and  always  throwing  him  back  so  that  even 
the  silhouette  fails  us.  Had  he  lived  a  hundred  years  earlier 
the  historian  perhaps  would  have  been  no  more  tolerant  of  the 
Tongues  or  the  miracles:  but  he  would  have  picked  out  of  the  , 
manifold  ravings  of  the  time,  however  dreary  or  unintelligible, 
such  a  picture  of  the  heroic  and  stainless  soul  deceived,  as  should 
have  moved  us  to  the  depths  of  our  heart :  perhaps  thrown  some 
new  light  upon  spiritual  phenomena  ever  recurring,  whether  as 
a  delusion  of  the  devil,  or  a  mortal  mistake  and  blunder ;  at  least 
have  set  the  prophet  before  us  in  a  flood  of  illumination,  of  rev- 
erence, and  compunction  and  tenderness. 

But  this  gift  which  has  made  Abbot  Sampson  one  of  our 
dearest  friends,  stands  us  in  no  stead  with  the  man  who  stood 
by  the  writer's  elbow,  whose  breath  was  on  his  cheek,  who  was 
the  friend  and  companion  of  his  early  years.  Strange!  and  yet 
so  natural,  that  we  have  only  to  inte-rogate  ourselves  to  under- 
stand such  a  disability.  He  knew  his  friend  far  too  well  to  know 
him  at  all  in  this  way.  He  was  not  indifferent  enough  to  per- 
ceive the  tendencies  of  his  being  or  the  workings  of  his  mind. 
These  tendencies  moved  him,  not  to  calm  observation,  but  to  hot 
opposition  and  pain,  and  anxious  thought  of  the  results — to  the 
anger  and  the  impatience  of  affection,  not  to  the  tolerance  and 
even  creative  enjoyment  of  the  poet  who  tinds  so  noble  a  subject 
ready  to  his  hand. 

In  a  very  different  fashion  which  is  yet  the  same,  the  prolonged 
sketch  of  his  wife,  which  almost  fills  one  volume,  and  more  or  less 
runs  through  both,  will  fail  to  give  to  the  general  reader  any  idea 
of  a  very  remarkable  woman  full  of  character  and  genius.  This 
memoir  shares  the  ineffectiveness  of  the  others,  and  labors  under 
the  same  disadvantages,  with  this  additional,  that  his  "  dearest 


THOMAS  CARLYLE.  I9S 

and  beautifulest;*'  his  "  little  darling,"  his  "  bonnie  little  woman/' 
continues  always  young  to  him,  more  or  less  surrounded  with 
the  love-halo  of.  their  youth,  a  light  which,  after  the  rude  tear 
and  wear  of  the  world  which  they  both  went  through,  it  is  hard 
to  understand  as  existing  thus  unmodified  either  in  his  eyes  or 
about  her  remarkable  and  most  individual  person.  To  many  of 
those  who  loved  her  tfiere  must  be  a  painful  want  of  harmony 
between  the  woman  they  knew,  not  old  because  of  her  force  and 
endless  energy,  but  worn  into  the  wrinkles  and  sparenessof  age, 
with  her  swift  caustic  wit,  her  relentless  insight,  and  potent 
humor — and  all  those  gentle  epithets  of  tenderness,  and  the 
pretty  air  of  a  domestic  idol,  a  wife  always  enshrined  and  beau- 
tiful which  surrounds  her  in  these  pages.  That  such  was  her 
aspect  to  him  wd  learn  with  thankfulness  for  her  sake ;  though 
it  is  very  doubtful  how  far  she  realized  that  it  was  so ;  but  this 
was  not  her  ouside  aspect,  and  I  shrink  a  little,  as  if  failing  of 
respect  to  so  dear  and  fine  a  memory,  when  I  read  out  the  sen- 
tences in  which  she  appears,  though  with  endless  tributes  of  love 
and  praise,  as  the  nimble,  sprightly,  dauntless,  almost  girlish  fig- 
ure, which  she  seems  to  have  always  appeared  to  him.  It  must 
be  added  that  a  strong  compunction  runs  through  the  tale,  per- 
haps not  stronger  than  the  natural  compunction  with  which  we 
all  remember  the  things  we  have  left  unsaid,  the  thanks  un ren- 
dered, the  tenderness  withheld,  as  soon  as  the  time  has  come 
when  we  can  show  our  tenderness  no  longer;  but  which  may 
make  many  believe,  and  some  say,  that  Carlyle's  thousand  expres- 
sions of  fondness  were  a  remorseful  make  up  for  actual  neglect. 
I  am  not  one  of  those  who  think  so ;  but  it  would  be  natural 
enough.  That  he  had  any  intention  of  neglect,  or  that  his  heart 
ever  strayed  from  her,  I  am  very  little  disposed  to  believe;  but 
there  were  circumstances  in  their  life  which  to  him.  the  man, 
were  very  light;  but  to  her  were  not  without  their  bitterness, 
little  appreciated  or  understood  by  him. 

Here  is  one  case  for  instance.     "  We  went  pretty  often,  I  think 
I  myself  far  the*  oftener,  as  usual  in  such  cases  my  loyal  little 


Ig6  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE^, 

darling  taking  no  manner  of  offense  not  to  participate^  in  my  lion- 
ings,  but  behaving  like  the  royal  soul  she  was,  I  duUard  egoist, 
taking  no  special  recognition  of  such  nobleness."  She  "  took  no 
manner  of  otfense,"  was  far  too  noble  and  genuine  to  take  offense. 
Yet  with  a  little  humorous  twitch  at  the  corner  of  her  eloquent 
^outh  would  tell  sometimes  of  the  fine  people  who  left  hct  out 
in  their  invitations  as  the  great  man's  insignificant  wife,  with  a 
keen  mot  which  told  of  individual  iceling  not  extinguished, 
though  entirely  repressible  and  under  her  command.  And  Car- 
lyle  did  what  most  men-r-what  almost  every  human  creature  does 
when  attended  by  such  a  ministry  in  life  as  hers;  accepted  the 
service  and  sacrifice  of  all  her  faculties  which  she  made  to  him, 
with,  at  the  bottom,  a  real  understanding  and  appreciation  no 
doubt,  but,  on  the  surface,  a  calm  ease  of  acquiescence  as  if  it  had 
been  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world.  She  for  her  part — let 
us  not  be  misunderstood  jn  saying  so — contemplated  him,  her 
great  companion  in  life,  with  a  certain  humorous  curiosity  not 
untinged  with  affectionate  contempt  and  wonder  that  a  creature 
so  big  should  be  at  the  same  time  so  little,  such  agrant  and  com- 
manding genius  with  all  the  same  so  many  babyish  weaknesses 
for  which  she  liked  him  all  the  better !  Women  very  often,  more 
often  than  not,  do  regard  their  heroes  so, — admiration  and  the 
confidence  of  knowledge  superior  to  that  of  any  one  else  of  their 
power  and  bright  qualities,  permitting  this  tender  contempt  for 
those  vagaries  of  the  wise  andfollies  of  the  strong.  To  sec  what 
he  will  do  next,  the  big  blundering  male  creature,  unconscious 
entirely  of  that  fine  scrutiny,  malin  but  tender,  which  sees 
through  and  through  him,  is  a  constant  suppressed  interest 
which  gives  piquancy  to  life,  and  this  Carlyle's  wife  took  her 
full  enjoyment  of.  He  was  never  in  the  least  conscious  of  it.  I 
believe  few  of  its  subjects  are.  Thus  she  would  speak  of  The 
Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Frederick  in  her  letters,  and  of  how  the 
results  of  a  bad  day's  work  would  become  apparent  in  the  shape 
of  a  gloomy  apparition,  brow  lowering,  mouth  shut  tight,  cram- 
ming down  upon  the  fire,  not  a  word  said — at  least  till  after  this 


f 


THOMAS  CARLYLE,  197 

burnt-offering,  the  blurred  sheets  of  unsuccessful  work.  Never 
a  little  incident  she  told  but  the  listener  could  see  it,  so  graphic, 
so  wonderful  was  her  gift  of  narrative.  It  did  not  matter  what 
was  the  subject,  whether  that  gaunt  figure  in  the  gray  coat, 
stalking  silently  in,  to  consume  on  her  fire  the  day's  work  which 
displeased  him,  or  the  cocks  and  hens  which  a  magnanimous 
neighbor  sacrificed  to  the  rest  of  the  Sage  ;  whether  it  was  the 
wonderful  ^tory  of  a,  maid-of-all-work,  most  accomplished  of 
waiting^maidens,  which  kept  the  hearer  breathless,  or  the  turn- 
ing outside  in  of  a  famed  philosopher.  Scherazade  was  nothing 
to  this  brilliant  story-teller;  for  the  Sultana  required  the  aid  of 
wonderful  incident  and  romantic  adventure,  whereas  this  mod- 
em gentlewoman  needed  nothing  but  life,  of  which  she  was  so 
profound  and  Ainpretending  a  student.  I  have  never  known  a 
gift  like  hers,'  except  far  off  in  the  person  of  another  Scotch  gen- 
tlewoman, unknown  to  fame,  of  whom  I  have  been  used  to  say 
that  I  remembered  the  incidents  of  her  youth  far  more  vividly 
than  my  own. 

The  story  of  the  cocks  and  hens  above  referred  to  is  a  very 
good  illustration  both  of  the  narrator  and  her  gift,  though  Ican- 
njot  pretend  to  give  it  the  high  dramatic  completeness,  the  lively 
comic  force  of  the  original.  There  is  another  incident  of  a  similar 
character  mentioned  in  these"  Reminiscences,"  when  the  heroic 
remedy  of  renting  the  house  next  door  in  order  to  get  rid  of  the 
fowls  was  seriously  thought  of.  But,  in  the  case  which  she  used 
to  tell,  there  were  serious  complications.  The  owners  of  the 
poultry  were  women, — alas,  not  of  a  kind  to  be  recognized  as 
neighbors.  How  it  came  about  that  members  of  this  unfortu- 
nate class  should  have  domiciled  themselves  next  door  to  the 
severe  philosopher  in  the  blameless  atmosphere  of  Cheyne  Row 
I  cannot  tell ;  but  there  they  were,  in  full  possession.  Nor  do  I 
remember  how  they  discovered  that  Mr.  Carlyle's  rest,  always 
so  precarious,  was  rendered  altogether  impossible  by  the  inhabit- 
ants of  their  little  fowl -house.  When,  however,  a  night  or  two 
of  torture  had  driven  the  household  frantic,  this  intelligence  was 


198  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

^omebow  conveyed  to  the  dwellers  next  door ;  and  the  most  vir- 
tuous of  neighbors  could  not  have  behaved  more  nobly.  That 
very  evening  a  cab  drove  up  to  the  door,  and,  all  the  inhabitants 
crowding  to  the  w^indows  to  see  the  exodus — a  cackling  and 
frightened  procession  of  fowls  was  driven,  coaxed,  and  carried 
into  it,  and  sent  away  with  acclamations.  Mrs.  Carlyle  pondered 
for  some  time  what  to  do,  but  finally  decided  that  it  was  her 
duty  to  call  and  thank  the  author  of  this  magnanimous  sacrifice. 
Entirely  fearless  of  remark  by  nature,  past  the  age,  and  never  of 
the  temperament  to  be  alarmed  by  any  idea  of  indecorum,  she 
was  also,  it  must  be  allowed,  a  little  curious  about  these  extra- 
ordinary neighbors.  She  found  a  person  noted  among  her  kind, 
a  bright  and  capable  creature,  as  she  described  her,  with  sleeves 
rolled  up  on  her  round  arms  making  a  pie !  almost,  one  would 
have  said,  a  voucher  of  respectability:  who  accepted  her  thanks 
with  simplicity,  and  showed  no  alarm  at  the  sight  of  her.  It  was 
characteristic  that  any  thought  of  missionary  usefulness,  of  per- 
suading the  cheerful  and  handsome  sinner  to  abandon  her  evil 
life,  never  seems  for  a  moment  to  have  suggested  itself.  Was  it 
something  of  that  disgust  with  thehollownessof  the  respectable, 
and  indignant  sense  of  the  depths  that  underlie  society,  and  are 
glossed  over  by  all  decorous  chroniclers,  which  appears  in  every- 
thing her  husband  wrote,  that  produced  this  strange  impartiality  ? 
It  would  be  hard  to  say ;  but  she  was  a  much  closer  student  of 
actual  life  than  he,  and  \vith  a  scorn  beyond  words  for  impurity.* 
which  to  her  was  the  most  impossible  thing  in  life,  had  sufficient 
experience  of  its  existence  elsewhere  to  give  her  something  of  a 
cynical  indifference  to  this  more  honest  turpitude.  She  went 
with  no  intention  of  judging  or  criticising,  but  with  a  frank  grat- 
itude for  service  done,  and  (it  cannot  be  denied)  a  little  curiosity, 

*  I  have  been  told  a  most  characteristic  anecdote  on  this  point :  how  returning 
one  evening  alone  from  a  friend's  house,  in  her  dauntless  way,  she  was  accosted, 
being  then  ia  young  and  pretty  woman,  by  some  man  in  the  street.  She  looked  at 
him  with,  one  can  well  imagine  what  immeasurable  scorn,  uttered  the  one  vofii 
*♦  Idiot ! "  and  went  upon  her  way.  .  ' 


THOMAS  CAKLYLL,  ^  1 99 

t6  se^  hdw  life  under  such  circumstances  was  made  possible. 
And  there  must  have  been  perceptions  (as  the  visitor  perceived) 
in  the  other  woman  ;  she  showed  her  gratitude  for  this  human 
treatment  of  her  by  taking  herself  and  her  household  off  instantly 
into  more  congenial  haunts. 

Even  this  incident,  so  small  as  it  is,  will  show  hew  little  in  her 
characteristic  force  such  a  woman  is  represented  by  Carlylc's 
compunctious,  tender  apostrophes  to  his  "little  darling."  The 
newspaper  tributes  to  his  ** gentle  wife."  and  the  "  feminine  soft- 
ness" which  she  shed  about  him,  which  abounded  at  the  time 
other  death,  struck  me  with  a  sort  of  scorn  and  pain  as  more 
absurdly  conventional  and  fictitious,  in  reference  to  her,  than  any 
blind  panegyrics  I  had  ever  heard — the  sort  of  adjectives  which 
are  applied  indiscriminately,  whether  the  subject  of  them  is  a 
heroic  Alcestis  or  a  mild  housewife.  It  was  to  the  former,  rather 
.  than  the  latter,  character  that  Mrs.  Carlylc  belonged,  notwith- 
standing the  careful  orderliness  of  which  her  husband  was  so 
proud — ^the  gracefulness  and  fitness  with  which  she  made  her 
home  beautiful,  of  which  he  brags  with  many  a  tender  repetition : 
and  that  fine  gift  of  household  economy  which  carried  them 
safe  through  all  their  days  of  struggle.  Her  endless  energy, 
vivacity,  and  self-control,  her  mastery  over  circumstances,  and , 
undaunted  acceptance  for  her  own  part  in  life  of  that  min- 
gled office  of  protector  and  dependent,  which  to  a  woman  con- 
scious of  so  many  powers  must  have  been  sometimes  bitter  if 
sometimes  also  sweet — it  is  perhaps  beyond  the  power  of  words 
to  set  fully  forth.  It  is  a  position  less  uncommon  than  people 
are  aware  of ;  and  the  usual  jargon  about  gentle  wives  and  fem- 
inine influences  is  ludicrously  inapplicable  in  cases  where  the 
strongest  of  qualities  and  the  utmost  force  of  character  are  called 
into  play.  Equally  inadequate,  but  far  more  touching,  are  those 
prolonged  maunderings  (forgive,  O  Master  revered  and  vener- 
able, yet  foolish  too  in  your  greatness  as  the  rest  of  us.*)  of  her 
distracted  and  desolate  husband  over  his  Jeanie,  which  one  loves 
him  the  better  for  having  poured  forth  in  sacred  grief  and  soli- 


200  \        THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

tude,  like  heaped  up  baskets  of  flowers,  never  too  many  or  too 
sweet,  over  her  grave,  but  which  never  should  have  been  pro- 
duced to  the  common  eye  by  way  of  showing  other  generations 
and  strange  circles  what  this  woman  was.  It  will  never  now  in 
all  likelihood  be  known  what  she  was,  unless  her  letters,  which 
we  are  promised,  and  the  clearer  sight  of  Mr.  Carlyle's  biographer 
accomplish  it  for  us — a  hope  which  would  have  been  almost  cer- 
tainty but  for  this  publication,  which  makes  us  tremble  lest  Mr. 
Froude  should  have  breathed  so  long  the  same  atmosphere  as 
the  great  man  departed,  to  whom  he  has  rfcted  the  part  of  the 
best  of  sons— as  to  blunt  his  power  of  judgment,  and  the  critical 
perception,  which  in  such  a  case  is  the  highest  proof  of  love. 
Doubtless  he  felt  Carlyle's  own  utterances  too  sacred  to  tainper 
with.  We  can  only  with  all  our  hearts  regret  the  natural  but 
unfortunate  superstition. 

It  has  been  said  that  these  "  Reminiscences"  are^full  of  com- 
punction. Here  is  one  of  the  most  distinct  examples  of  the 
husband's  inadvertence — so  common,  so  daily  recurring — an  in- 
advertence of  which  we  are  all  guilty,  but  such  as  has  been  sel- 
dom recorded  with  such  fullness  of  after-comprehension  and 
remorseful  sorrow : 

'•  Her  courage,  patience,  silent  heroism  '^meanwhile  must 
often  have  been  immense.  Within  the  last  two  years  or  so  she 
has  told  me  about  my  talk  to  her  of  the  Battle  of  Mollwitz  on 
those  occasions  [i.e.,  the  half-hour  he  spent  with  her  on  return- 
ing from  his  walk]  while  that  was  on  the  anvil.  She. was  lying 
on  the  sofa  weak^— but  I  knew  little  how  weak — and  patient, 
kind,  quiet,  and  good  as  ever.  After  tugging  and  wriggling 
through  what  inextricable  labyrinth  and  slough  of  despond  I 
still  remember,  it  appears  I  had  at  last  conquered  Mollwitz,  s*w 
it  all  clear  ahead  and  round  me.  and  took  to  telling  her  about  i 
in  my  poor  bit  of  joy,  night  after  night.  I  recollect  she  answej 
little,  though  kindly  always.  Privately  at  that  time  she 
convinced  she  was  dying;  dark  winter,  and  such  the  weig 
misery  and  utter  decay  of  strength,  and,  night  after  nigb 


THOMAS  CARLYLE,  ^  20I 

theme  to  her,  Mollwitz  f  This  she  owned  to  me  within  the  last 
year  or  two,  which  how  could  I  listen  to  without  shame  and 
abasement  ?  Nevef  in  ray  pretended  superior  kind  of  life  have 
I  done  for  love  of  any  creature  so  supreme  a  kind  of  thing.  It 
touches  me  at  this  moment  with  penitence  and  humiliation,  yet 
with  a  kind  of  soft  religious  blessedness  too." 

This  and  a  hundred  other  endurances  of  a  similar  kind  had 
been  her  daily  use  and  wont  for  years,  while  she  too  toiled 
through  the  "valley  of  the  shadow  of  Frederick,"  her  mind 
never  free  of  some  preoccupation  on  his  account,  some  expe- 
dient to  soften  to  him  those  thorns  of  fate  with  which  all  crea- 
tion wais  bristling.  She  showed  me  one  daj*  a  skillful  arrange- 
ment of  curtains,  made  on  some  long-studied  scientific  principle 
by  which  "  at  lasi,t"  she  had  succeeded  in  shutting  out  the  noises, 
yet  letting  in  the  air.  Thus  she  stood  between  him  and  the 
world,  between  him  and  all  the  nameless  frets  and  inconven- 
iences of  life,  and  handed  on  to  us  the  reK:ord  of  her  endurance, 
with  a  humorous  turn  of  each  incident  as  if  these  were  the 
amusements  of  her  life.  There  was  always  a  comic  possibility 
in  them  in  her  hands. 

While  we  are  «.bout  it  we  must  quote  one  short  description 
more,  one  of  those  details  which  only  he  could  have  given  us, 
and  which  makes  the  tenderest  picture  of  this  half-hour  of  fire- 
side fellowship.  Carlyle  has  been  describing  his  way  of  work- 
ing, his  long  wrestling  "thirteen  years  and  more"  with  the 
"Friedrich  affair,"  his  disgusts  and  difficulties.  After  his  morn- 
ing's work  and  afternoon  ride  he  had  an  hour's  sleep  before  din- 
ner: "but  first  always  came  up  for  half  an  hour  to  the  drawing- 
room  and  her;  where  a  bright  kindly  fire  was  sure  to  be  burn- 
ing, candles  hardly  lit,  all  in  trustful  chiar-oscuro,  and  a  spoonful 
of  brandy  in  water  with  a  pipe  of  tobacco  (which  I  had  learned 
t6  take  sitting  on  the  rug  with  my  back  to  the  jamb,  and  door 
n^er  so  little  open,  so  that  all  the  smoke,  if  I  was  careful,  went 
tip  the  chimney)  this  was  the  one  bright  portion  of  my  black 
day.    Oh  those  evening  half-hours,  how  beautiful  and  blessed 


202  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

they  were,  not  awaiting  me  now  on  my  home  coming  I  She  was 
oftenest  reclining  on  the  sofa,  wearied  enough  she,  too,  with  her 
day's  doings  and  endurings.  But  her  history  even  of  whati«ras 
bad  had  such  grace  and  truth,  and  spontaneous  tinkling  mel- 
ody of  a  naturally  cheerful  and  loving  heart,  that  I  never  any- 
where enjoyed  the  like." 

This  explains  how  there  used  to  be  sometimes  visible  reposing 
in  the  corner  of  the  fireplace,  in  that  simple,  refined,  and  gra- 
cious little  drawing-room  so  free  of  any  vulgar  detail,  a  long 
white  clay  pipe,  of  the  kind  I  believe  which  is  called  church- 
warden. It  was  g,lw:iys  clean  and  white,  and  I  remember  think- 
ing it  rather  pretty  than  otherwise  with  its  long  curved  stem, 
and  bowl  unstained  by  any  "  color."  There  was  no  profanation 
in  its  presence,  a  thing  which  could  not  perhaps  be  said  for  the 
daintiest  of  cigarettes;  and  the  rugged  philosopher  upon  the 
hearthrug  pouring  out  his  record  of  labors  and  trpubles,  his  bat- 
tles of  Mollwitz,  his  Dryasdust  researches — yet  making  sure  "  if 
I  was  careful"  that  the  smoke  should  go  up  the  chimney  and 
not  disturb  the  sweetness  of  her  dwelling-place—makes  a  very 
delightful  picture.  He  admired  the  room,  and  all  her  little 
decorations  and  every  sign  of  the  perfect  lady  she  was,  with  an 
almost  awe  of  pleasure  and  pride,  in  which  it  was  impossible  not 
to  feel  his  profound  sense  of  the  difference  which  his  wife,  who 
was  a  gentlewoman,  had  made  in  the  surroundings  of  the  farm- 
er's l5on  of  Scotsbrig. 

My  first  interview  with  Mrs.  Carlyle  was  on  the  subject  of 
Irving,  her  first  tutor,  her  early  lover,  and  always  her  devoted 
admirer  and  friend.  To  have  been  beloved  by  two  such  men  was 
no  small  glory  to  a  woman.  She  took  to  me  most  kindly,  some- 
thing otj  the  score  of  a  half  imaginary  East  Lothianism  which 
she  thought  she  had  detected,  and  which  indeed  came  from  no 
persanal  knowledge  of  mine,  but  from  an  inherited  memory  of 
things  and  words  familiar  there.  And  I  shall  not  easily  forget 
ths  stream  of  delightful  talk  upon  which  we  were  instantly  set 
afloat,  she  with  all  the  skill  and  ease  and  natural  unte^chabl^ 


^     THOMAS  CARLYLE.  JOJ 

grace  of  a  born  min§trel  and  improvisatore,  flowing  forth  in 
story  after  story,  till  there  stood  before  me,  as  clear  as  if  I  saw 
it,  her  own  delightful  childhood  in  quiet  old-fashioned  Hadding- 
ton long  ago,  and  the  big  grand  boyish  gigantic  figure  of  her 
early  tutor  teaching  the  fairy  creature  Latin  and  logic,  and 
already  learning  of  her  something  more  penetrating  than  either. 
There  were  some  points  about  which  she  was  naturally  and  grace- 
fully reticent — about  her  own  love,  and  the  preference  which 
gradually  swept  Irving  out  of  her  girlish  fancy  if  he  had  ever 
been  fully  established  there,  a  point  on  which  she  left  her  hearer 
in  doubt.  But  there  was  another  sentiment  gradually  developed 
in  the  tale  which  gave  the  said  hearer  a  gleam  of  amusement 
unintended  by  the  narrator,  one  of  those  side-lights  of  self-reve- 
lation which  even  the  keenest  and  clearest  intelligence  lets  slip 
— which  washer  perfectly  genuine  feminine  dislike  of  the  woman 
who  replaced  her  in  Irving's  life,  his  wife  to  wh6m  he  had  been 
engaged  before  he  met  for  the  second  time  with  the  beaotiful 
girl  grown  up  to  womanhood,  who  had  been  his  baby  pupil  and 
adoration,  and  to  whom — with  escapades  of  wild  passion  for 
Jane,  andwild  proposals  to  fly  with  her  to  Greece,  if  that  could 
be,  or  anywhere — he  yet  was  willingly  or  unwillingly  faithful. 
This  dislike  looked  to  me  nothing  more  than  the  very  natural 
and  almost  universal  feminine  objection  to  the  woman  who  has 
consoled  even  a  rejected  lover.  The  only  wonder  was  that  she 
did  not  herself,  so  keen  and  clear  as  her  sight  was,  so  penetrat- 
ing and  impartial,  see  the  humor  of  it,  as  one  does  so  often  even 
while  fully  indulging  a  sentiment  so  natural,  yet  so  whimsically 
absurd.  But  the  extraordinary  sequence  of  this,  the  proof  wh'ch 
Carlyle  gives  of  his  boundless  sympathy  with  the  companion  of 
his  life,  by  taking  up  and  even  exaggerating  this  excusable  aver- 
sion of  hers,  is  one  of  the  strangest  of  mental  phenomena.  But 
for  the  marriage  to  which  Irving  had  been  so  long  pledged,  it 
is  "pYobableHhat  the  philosopher  would  never  have  had  that 
brightest,  "  beautifullest"  of  companions ;  and  yet  he  could  not 
forgive  the  woman  who  healed  the  heart  which  his  Jeanif^  bad 


204  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

broken  \  glorious  folly  ^rom  one  point  of  view,  strangest,  sharp, 
painful  prejudice  on  the  other. 

All  that  Carlyle  says  about  his  friend's  marriage  anvi  wife  is 
disagreeable,  painful,  and  fundamentally  untrue.  He  goes  out 
of  the  way  even  to  suggest  that  her  father's  family  "came  to  no 
good"  (an  utter  mistake  in  fact),  and  that  the  excellent  man 
who  married  Mrs.  Irving's  sister  was  "  not  over  well "  married, 
an  insinuation  as  completely  and. cruelly  baseless  as  ever  insin- 
uation was.  It  is  no  excuse  perhaps  to  allege  a  prejudice  so 
whimsical  as  the  ground  of  imputations  so  serious,  and  yet  there 
is  a  kind  of  mortal  foolishness  about  it,  which,  in  such  a  pair,  is 
half  ludicrous,  half  pitiful,  and  which  may  make  the  offended 
more  readily  forgive. 

Other  instances  of  his  curious  loyal  yet  almost  prosaic  adop- 
tion of  suggestions,  taken  evidently  from  his  wife,  will  readily 
be  noticed  by  the  judicious  reader.  There  is  a  remark  about  a 
lady'^ dress,  which  "must  have  required  daily  the  fastening  of 
sixty  or  eighty  pins,"  unquestionably  a  bit  of  harmless  satire 
upon  the  exquisite  arrangement  of  the  garment  in  question 
flashed  forth  in  rapid  talk,  and  meaning  little;  but  fastening 
somehow  with  its  keen  little  pin-point  in  the  philosopher's  seri- 
ous memory,  to  be  brought  out  half  a  lifetime  after,  alack  !  and 
give  its  wound.  It  is  most  strange  and  pitiful  to  see  those 
straws  and  chips  which  she  dropped  unawares  thus  carefully 
gathered  and  preserved  in  his  memory,  to  be  reproduced  with  a 
kind  of  pious  foolishness  in  honor  of  her  who  would  have  swept 
them  all  away,  had  she  been  here  to  guard  his  good  name  as  she 
did  all  her  life. 

I  must  say  something  here  about  the  tone  of  remark  offensive 
to  so  many  personally,  and  painful  above  measure  to  all  who, 
loved  or  reverenced  Carlyle,  which  is  the  most  astonishing  pecu- 
liarity of  this  book.  The  reader  must  endeavor  to  call  before 
himself  the  circumstances  under  which  all  of  it,  except  tKe 
sketch  of  his  father,  was  written.  He  had  lost  the  beloved  com- 
panion whom,  as  we  all  do,  yet  perhaps  with  more  remorse  and 


THaMAS  CARL^LE,  20$ 

a  little  more  reason  than  most,  he  for  the  first  time  fully  per- 
ceived himself  never  to  have  done  full  justice  to :  he  had  been 
left  desolate  with  every  circumstance  of  misery  added  which  it  is 
possible  to  imagine,  for  she  had  died  while  he  was  absent,  while  he 
was  in  the  midst  of  oneof  the  few  triumphs  of  his  life,  surrounded 
by  uncongenial  noise  of  applause  which  he  had  schooled  himself 
to  take  pleasure  in,  and  which  he  liked  too,  though  he  hated  it. 
It  was  when  he  found  himsejf  thus  for  the  first  ti»Tie  in  the  midst 
of  acclamations  which  gratified  him  as  signs  of  appreciation  and 
esteena  long  withheld,  scarcely  looked  for  in  this  life,  but  which 
in  every  nerve  of  his  tingling  frame  he  shrank  from — at  that 
moment  of  all  others,  while  he  bravely  endured  and  enjoyed  his 
climax  of  fame,  that  he  was  struck  to  the  heart  by  the  one  blow 
which  life  had  in  reserve  for  him,  the  only  blow  which  could 
strike  him  to  the  heart !  How  strange,  how  Qver-appropriate 
this  end  to  all  the  remaining  possibilities  of  existence !  He  was 
a  man  in  whose  mind  a  morbid  tendency  to  irritation  mingled 
with  everything;  and  there  is  no  state  of  mind  in  which  we  are 
so  easily  irritated  as  in  grief.  If  there  is  indeed  **a  far-off  inter- 
est of  tears,"  which  we  may  gather  when  pain  has  been  dead- 
ened, this  is  seldom  felt  at  the  moment  save  in  the  gentlest 
nature.  He  was  not  prostrated  as  some  are.  On  the  contrary, 
it  is  evident  that  he  was  roused  to  that  feverish  energy  of  pain 
which  is  the  result  in  some  natures  of  a  shock  which  makes  the 
whole  being  reel.  And' after  the  first  terrible  months  at  home, 
kind  friends,  as  tender  of  him  as  if  they  had  been  his  children, 
would  not  let  him  alone  to  sit  forlorn  in  the  middle  of  her  room, 
as  I  found  him  when  I  .saw  him  first  after  4ier  death,  talking  of 
her,  telling  little  broken  anecdotes  of  her,  reaching  far  back  into 
the  forgotten  years.  They  insisted  onappl5Mng  to  him  the  usual 
remedies  which  in  our  day  are  always  suggested  when  life 
becomes  intolerable.  Not  to  take  away  that  life  itself  for  a  time 
which.would  be  the  real  assuagement,  could  it  be  accomplished, 
but  to  take  the  mourner  away  into  new  scenes,  to  "a  thorough 
change,"  to  beautiful  and  unfamiliar  places,  where  it  is  supposed 


ao6    '  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

the  ghdsts  of  what  has  been  cannot  follow  him,  nor  associations 
v(ound  him.  He  was  taken  to  Mentone,  of  all  places  in  the 
world,  to  the  deadly-liveliness  and  quiet,  the  soft  air,  and  invalid 
surroundings  of  that  shelter  of  the  suffer  ng.  When  he  came 
back  he  described  it  to  me  one  day  with  that  sort  of  impatient 
contempt  of  the  place  which  was  natural  to  a  Borderer,  as  **a 
shelf  "  between  the  hills  and  the  sea.  He  had  no  air  to  breathe, 
no  space  to  move  in.  All  the  width  and  breadth  of  his  own 
moorland  landscape  was  involved  in  the  description  of  that 
lovely  spot,  in  its  stagnant  mildness  and  monotonous  beauty. 
He  told  me  how  he  had  roamed  under  the  greenness  of  the 
unnatural  trees,  "perhaps  the  saddest,"  he  said  with  the  linger- 
ing vowels  of  his  native  speech,  "of  all  the  sons  of  Adam." 
And,  at  first  alone  in  his  desolate  house,  and  then  stranded  there 
upon  that  alien  shore  where  everything  was  so  soft  and  unlike 
him  in  his  gaunt  and  self-devouring-  misery,  he  seized  upon  the 
familiar  pen,  the  instrument  of  his  power,  which  he  had  laid 
aside  after  the  prolonged  effort  of  **  Frederick,"  with  more  or 
less  idea  that  it  was  done  with,  and  rest  to  be  his  henceforth, 
and  poured  forth  his  troubled  agony  of  soul,  his  restless  quick- 
ened life,  the  heart  which  had  no  longer  a  natural  outlet  close  at 
hand. 

"  Perhaps  the  saddest  of  all  the  sons  of  Adam  J"  In  this  short 
period,  momentary  as  compared  with  the  time  which  he  took  to 
his  other  works,  fretted  by  solitude  and  by  the  novelty  of  sur- 
roundings which  were  so  uncongenial,  he  poured  forth,  scarcely 
knowing  what  he  did,  almost  the  entire  bulk  of  these  two  vol- 
umes, work  which  would  have  taken  him  three  or  four  times  as 
long  to  produce  had  he  not  been  wild  with  grief,  distraught,  and 
full  of  somber  excitement,  seeking  in  that  way  a  relief  to  his 
corroding  thoughts.  Let  any  one  who  is  offended  by  these 
"  Reminiscences"  think  of  this.  He  never  looked  at  the  dis- 
turbed and  unhappy  record  of  this  passion  again;  "did  not 
know  to  what  I  was  alluding,"  when  his  friend  and  literary- 
executor  spoke  to  him,  two  years  later,  of  the  Irving  sketch. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE.  20/ 

Miserable  in  body  and  mind,  his  nerves  all  twisted  the  wrong 
way,  his  heart  rent  and  torn,  full  of  sorrow,  irritation,  remorse- 
ful feeling,  and  all  the  impotent  longings  of  grief,  no  doubt  the 
sharpness  of  those  discordant  notes,  the  strokes  dealt  blindly  all 
about  him,  were  a  kind  of  bitter  relief  to  the  restless  misery 
of  his  soul.  This  is  no  excuse;  there  is  no  excuse  to  offer  for 
sharp  words,  often  so  petty,  always  so  painful,  in  many  cases 
entirely  unfounded  or  mistaken ;  but  what  can  be  a  more  evi- 
dent proof  that  they  were  never  meant  for  the  public  eye  than 
Mr.  Fronde's  "did  not  know  to  what  I  alluded"?  He  who 
would  spend  an  anxious  week  sometimes  (as  Mrs.  Carlyle  often 
told)  to  make  sure  whether  a  certain  incident  happened  on  the 
2 1st  or  22d  of  a  month  in  the  Sixteen  or  Seventeen  Hundreds, 
it  is  not  credible  that  he  should  wittingly  dash  forth  dozens  of 
unverified  statements — statements  which,  if  true,  it  would  be 
impossible  to  verify,  which,  if  untrue,  would  give  boundless  pain 
— upon  the  world.  And  there  is  nothing  of  the  deliberate  pos- 
thumous malice  of  Miss  Martineau  in  the  book;  there  is  noth- 
ing deliberate  in  it  at  all.  It  is  a  long  and  painful  musing,  self- 
recollection,  self-relief,  which  should  have  been  buried  with 
sacred  pity,  or  burned  with  sacred  fire,  all  that  was  unkind  of  it 
— ^and  the  rest  read  with  reverence  and  tears. 

The  first  sight  I  had  of  him  after  his  wife's  death  was  in  her 
drawing-room,  where  while  she  lived  he  was  little  visible,  except 
in  the  evening,  to  chance  visitors.  The  pretty  room,  a  little 
faded,  what  we  call  old-fashioned,  in  subdued  color  which  was 
certainly  not  "the  fashion"  at  the  time  it  was  furnished,  with 
the  great  picture  of  little  Frederick  and  his  sister  Wihelmine 
filling  up  one  end,  was  in  deadly  good  order,  without  any  of  her 
little  arrangements  of  chair  or  table,  and  yet  was  full  of  her  still. 
He  was  seated,  not  in  arty  familiar  corner,  but  with  the  forlorn- 
est  unaccustomedness,  in  the  middle  of  it,  as  if  to  show  by  harsh 
symbol  how  entirely  all  customs  were  broken  for  him.  He 
began  to  talk 'of  her,  as  of  the  one  subject  of  which  his  mind 
was  full,  with  a  sort  of  subdued,  half-bitter  brag  of  satisfaction 


208  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

in  the,  fact  that  her  choice  of  him,  so  troublesome  a  partner, ^o 
poor,  had  been  justified  before  all  men,  and  herself  proved  right 
after  all  in  her  opinion  of  him  which  she  had  upheld  against  all 
objections;  from  which»  curiously  enough,  his  mind  passed  to 
the  •'  mythical,"  as  he  calls  it,  to  those  early  legends  of  childhood 
which  had  been  told  by  herself  and  jotted  down  by  Geraldine 
Jewsbury,  our  dear  and  vivacious  friend  now,  like  both  of  them, 
departed.  He  told  me  thereupon  the  story  of  the  "Dancing- 
School  Ball  " — which  the  reader  will  find  in  the  second  volun^e 
— without  rhyme  or  reason ;  nothing  had  occurred  to  lead  his 
mind  to  a  trifle  so  far  away.  With  that  pathetic  broken  laugh, 
and  the  gleam  of  restless,  feverish  pain  in  his  eyes,  he  began  to 
tell  me  of  this  childish  incident ;  how  she  had  been  carried  to 
the  ball  in  a  clothes-basket,  "perhaps  the  loveliest  little  fairy 
that  was  on  this  earth  at  the  time."  The  contrast  of  the  old 
man's  already  tottering  and  feeble  frame,  his  weather-beaten, and 
worn  countenance  agitated  by  that  restless  grief,  and  the  sug- 
gestion of  this  "loveliest  little  fairy r*  was  as  pathetic  as  can  be 
conceived,  especially  as  I  had  so  clearly  in  my  mind  the  image 
of  her  too — her  palest,  worn,  yet  resolute  face,  her  feeble,  ner- 
vous frame,  past  sixty,  and  sorely  broken  with  all  the  assaults  of 
lifei  Nothing  that  he  could  have  said  of  her  last  days,  no  record 
of  sorrow,  could  have  been  so  heart-rending  as  that  description 
and  the  laugh  of  emotion  that  accompanied  it.  His  old  wife' 
was  still  so  fair  to  him,  even  across  the  straits  of  death — had 
returned  indeed  into  everlasting  youth,  as  all  the  record  he  has 
since  made  of  her  shows.  When  there  was  reference  to  the  cir- 
cumstances of  her  death,  so  tragical  and  sudden,  it  was  with 
bitter  wrath,  yet  wondering  awe,  of  such  a  contemptible  reason 
for  so  great  an  event — that  he  spoke  of — "the  little  Vermin  of  a 
dogue"  which  caused  the  shock  that  killed  her,  and  which  was 
not  even  her  own,  but  left  in  her  charge  by  a  friend ;  terrible 
littleness  and  haphazard  employed  to  bring  about  the  greatest 
individual  determinations  of  Providence — as  he  himself  so  often 
traced  them  out. 


I 


THOMAS  CARL  YLE.    "  209 

My  brief  visits  to  Carlyle  after  this  are  almost  all  marked  in 
my  memory  by  some  little  word  of  individual  and  most  charac- 
teristic utterance,  which  may  convey  very  little  indeed  to  those 
who  did  not  know  hiki,  but  which  those  who  did  will  readily 
recognize.  I  4iad  been  very  anxious  that  he  should  come  lo 
Eton,  at  first  while  he  was  stronger,  that  he  should  make  some 
little  address  to  the  boys — ^and  later  that  he  might  at  least  be 
seen  by'  all  this  world  of  lively  young  souls,  the  men  of  the 
future.  His  wife  had  encouraged  the  idea,  saying  that  it  was 
really  pleasant  to  him  to  receive  any  proof  of  human  apprecia- 
tion, to  know  that  he  was  cared  for  and  thought  of ;  but  it  was 
not  till  several  years  after  her  loss  that,  one  bright  summer 
morning.  I  had  the  boldness  to  suggest  it.  By  this  time  he 
seemed  to  have  made  a  great  downward  step  and  changed  into 
his  later  aspect  of  extreme  weakness,  a  change  for  which  I  had 
not  been  prepared.  He  shook  his  head,  but  yet  hesitated.  Yes, 
he  would  like,  he  said,  to  see  the  boys:  and  if  he  could  have 
stepped  into  a  boat  at  the  nearest  pier  and  been  carried  quietly 

up  the  river .   But  he  was  not  able  for  the  jar  of  little  railway 

journeys  ^nd  changes ;  and  then  he  told  me  of  the  weakness 
that  had  come  over  him,  the  failing  of  age  in  all  his  limbs  and 
faculties,  and  quoted  the  psalm  (in  that  version  which  we  Scots 
are  born  to) : 

Threescore  and  ten  years  do  sum  up 

Oiu*  days  and  years,  we  see ; 
And  if,  by  reason  of  more  strength, 

In  some  fourscore'  they  be  ; 
Yet  doth  the  strength  of  such  old  men 

But  grief  and  labor  prove. 

Neither  he  nor  I  could  remember  the  next  two  lines,  which  are 
harsh  enough,  Heaven  knows ;  and  then  he  burst  forth  suddenly 
^into  one  of  those  unsteady  laughters.  "  It  is  a  mother  I  want," 
he  said,  with  mournful  humor:  the  pathetic  incongruity  amused 
his  fancy:  and  yet  it  was  so  true.  The  time  had  come  when 
anotbfiT  should  gird  lii«i  and  carry  him—  often  where  he  would 


2JI6  THE  LIBkAnV  MAdAZlNE. 

not.   Had  it  but  been  possible  to  have  a  mother  to  care  for  that 
final  childhood ! 

The  last  time  I  saw  him  leaves  a  pleasant  picture  on  my  mem- 
ory. In  the  height  of  summer  I  had  g<5fte  a  little  too  late  one 
afternoon,  and  found  him  in  the  carriage  just  setting  out  for  his 
usual  drive,  weary  and  irritated  by  the  fatigue  of  the  movement 
down-stairs,  encumbered  with  wraps  though  the  sun  was  blazr 
ing ;  and  it  was  then  he  had  §aid,  **  It  is  death  I  want — all  I  want 
is  to  die."  Though  there  was  nothing  really  inappropriate  in 
this  utterance,  after  more  than  eighty  years  of  labor  and  sorrow, 
it  is  one  which  can  never  be  heard  by  mortal  ears  without  a  pang 
aiid  sense  of  misery.  Human  nature  resents  it,  as  a  slight  to  the 
life  which  it  prizes  above  all  things.  I  could  not  bear  that  this 
should  be  my  last  sight  of  Carlyle,and  went  back  sooner  than 
usual  in  hopes  of  carrying  away  a  happier  impression. 

I  found  him  alone,  seated  in  that  room  which  to  him,  as  to 
me,  was  still  her  room,  and  full  of  suggestions  of  her — a  place  in 
which  he  was  still  a  superfluous  figure,  never  entirely  domiciled  ^ 
and  at  home.  Few  people  are  entirely  unacquainted  with  that 
characteristic  figure,  so  worn  and  feeble,  yet  never  Ipsing  its 
marked  identity ;  his  shaggy  hair  falling  rather  wildly  about  his 
forehead,  his  vigorous  grizzly  beard,  his  keen  eyes  gleaming -from 
below  that  overhanging  ridge  of  forehead,  from  under  the  shaggy 
caverns  of  his  eyebrows;  his  deep-toned  complexion,  almost  of 
an  orange-red,  like  that  of  an  outdoor  laborer,  a  man  exposed 
to  wind  and  storm  and  much  *'  knitting  of  his  brows  under  the 
glaring  sun;"  his  gaunt,  tall,  tottering  figure  always  wrapped  in 
a  long,  dark  gray  coat  or  dressing-gown,  the  cloth  of  which, 
carefully  and  with  difficulty  sought  out  for  him,  had  cost  doubly 
dear  both  in  money  and  trouble,  in  that  he  insisted  upon  its 
being  entirely  genuine  cloth,  without  a  suspicion  of  shoddy  ;  his 
large,  bony,  tremulous  hands,  long  useless  for  any  exertion — 
scarcely,  with  a  great  effort,  capable  of  carrying  a  cup  to  his  lips. 
There  he  sat,  as  he  had  sat  for  all  these  years,  since  her  depart- 
ux^  left  him  stranded,  a  helpless  man  amid  the  wrecks  ol  life. 


tirOUAS  CARLYL^,  111 

fever  ddurteous.  full  of  old-fashiondd  politeness,  he  would  totter 
to  his  feet  to  greet  his  visitor,  even  in  that  last  languor.  This 
time  he  was  not  uncheerful.  It  was  inevitable  that  he  should 
repeat  that  prevailing  sentiment  always  in  his  mind  about  the 
death  for  which  he  was  waiting ;  but  he  soon  turned  to  a  very 
different  subject.  In  this  old  house,  never  before  brightened  by 
the  sight  of  children,  a  baby  had  been  born,  a  new  Thomas  Car- 
lyle,  the  child  of  his  niece  and  nephew,  a$  near  to  him  as  it  was 
possible  for  any  living  thing  in  the  third  generation  to  be.  He 
spoke  of  it  with  tender  amusement  and  wonder.  It  was  "  a  bon- 
nie  little  manikin,"  a  perfectly  good  and  well-conditioned  child, 
taking  life  sweetly,  and  making  no  more  than  the  inevitable 
commotion  in  the  tranquil  house.  There  had  been  fears  as  to 
how  he  would  take  this  innocent  intruder,  whether  its  advent 
might  disturb  or  annoy  him;  on  the  contrary,  it  gave  him  a 
half-amused  and  genial  pleasure,  tinged  with  his  prevailing  sen- 
timent, yet  full  of  natural  satisfaction  in  the  continuance  of  his 
name  and  race.  This  little  life  coming  unconscious  across  the 
still  scene  in  which  he  attended  the  slow  arrival  of  death,  awoke 
in  its  most  intimate  and  touching  form  the  self-reference  and 
comparison  which  was  habitual  to  him.  It  was  curious;  he  said, 
very  curious !  thus  to  contrast  tfie  new-comer  with  "  the  parting 
guest."  It  was  a  new  view  to  him,  bringing  together  the  exit 
and  the  entrance  with  a  force  both  humorous  and  solemn.  The 
"  bonnie  little  manikin,"  one  would  imagine,  pushed  him  softly, 
tenderly,  with  baby  hands  not  much  less  serviceable  than  his 
own,  towards  the  verge.  The  old  man  looked  on  with  a  half- 
incredulous  and  wondering  mixture  of  pain  and  pleasure,  burst- 
ing into  one  of  those  convulsions  of  broken  laughter,  sudden 
and  strange,  which  were  part  of  his  habitual  utterance.  Thus  I 
left  him.  scarcely  restrained  by  his  weakness  from  his  old  habit 
of  accompanying  me  to  the  door.  For  he  was  courtly  in  those 
little  traditions  of  politeness,  and  had  often  conducted  me  down- 
stairs upon  his  arm,  when  I  was  fain  to  support  him  instead  of 
accepting  his  tremulous  guidance. 


212  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.     ^, 

And  that  was  my  last  sight  of  Thomas  Carlyle.  I  had  parted 
with  his  wife  a  day  or  two  before  her  death,  at  the  railway,  after 
a  little  visit  she  had  paid  me,  in  an  agony  of  apprehension  lest 
something  should  happen  to  her  on  the  brief  journey,  so  utterly 
Spent  was  she,  like  a  dying  woman,  but  always  indomitable,  suf- 
fering no  one  to  accompany  or  take  care  of  her.  Her  clear  and 
expressive  face,  in  ivory-palehess,  the  hair  still  dark,  untouched 
by  age,  upon  her  capacious  forehead,  the  eloquent  mouth, 
scarcely  owning  the  least  curve  of  a  smile  at  the  bright  wit  and 
humorous  brilliant  touches  which  kept  all  her  hearers  amused 
and  delighted,  seem  still  before  me.  She  was  full  of  his  Edin- 
burgh Rectorship,  of  the  excitement  and  pleasure  of  it,  and  pro- 
found heartfelt  yet  half-disdainful  satisfaction  in  that,  as  she 
'  thought,  late  recognition  of  what  he  was.  To  this  public. proof 
of  the  honor  in  which  his  country  held  him,  both  he  and  she 
seemed  to  attach  more  importance  than  it  deserved  ;  as  if  his 
country  had  only  then  learned  to  prize  and  honor  him.  But  the 
reader  must  not  suppose  that  this  gallant  woman,  who  had  pro- 
tected and  fought  for  him  through  all  his  struggles,  showed  her 
intense  sympathy  and  anxiety  now  in  any  sentimental  way  of 
tenderness.  She  had  arranged  everything  for  him  to  the  mi- 
nutest detail,  charging  her  deputy  with  the  very  spoonful  of 
stimulant  that  was  to  be  given  him  the  moment  before  he  made 
his  speech — but  all  the  same  shot  a  hundred  little  jibes  at  him 
as  she  talked,  and  felt  the  humor  of  the  great  man's  dependence 
upon  these  little  cares,  forestalling  all  less  tender  laughter  by 
her  own.  I  remember  one  of  these  jibes  (strange!  when  so 
many  brighter  and  better  utterances  cannot  be  recalled)  during 
one  of  the  long  drives  we  took  together,  when  she  had  held  me 
in  breathless  interest  by  a  variety  of  sketches  of  their  contempo- 
raries— the  immediate  chapter  being  one  which  might  be  called 
the  "  Loves  of  the  Philosophers" — I  interrupted  her  by  a  foolish 
remark  that  Mr.  Carlyle  alone,  of  all  his  peers,  seemed  to  have 
trodden  the  straight  way.  She  turned  upon  me  with  swifty 
rejoinder  and  just  an  amused  quiver  of  her  upper  lip.    **Mi> 


THOMAS  CARLYLE.  213 

dear,"  she  saidK^if  Mr.  Carlyle's  digestion  had  been  better  there 
IS  no  telling  what  he  might  have  done !"  Thus  she  would  take 
one  s  breath  away  with  a  sudden  met,  a  flash  of  unexpected 
satire,  a  Reen  swift  stroke  into  the  very  heart  of  pretense— which 
was  a  thing  impossible  in  her  presence.  Not  love  itself  could 
blind  her  to  the  characteristic  absurdities,  the  freaks  of  nature 
in  those  about  her — but  she  threw  a  dazzling  shield  over  them 
by  the  very  swiiftness  of  her  perception  and  wit  of  her  comment. 

There  are  many  senses  known  to  ajl  in  which  the  husband  is 
the  wife's  protector  against  the  risks  of  life.  It  is  indeed  a  com- 
monplace to  say  so,  universally  as  the  truth  is  acknowledged  ; 
but  there  is  a  sense  also  in  which  the  wife  is  the  natural  pro- 
tector of  the  husband,  which  has  been  much  less  noted.  It  is 
she  who  protects  iiim  from  the  comment,  from  the  too  close 
scrutiny  and  criticism  of  the  World,  drawing  a  sacred  veil  be- 
tween him  and  the  vulgar  eye,  furnishing  an  outlet  for  the  com- 
plaints and  grudges  which  would  lessen  his  dignity  among  his 
fellow-men.  And  perhaps  it  is  the  man  of  genius  who  wants 
this  protection  most  of  all.  Mrs.  Carlyle  was  her  husband's 
screen  and  shield  in  these  respects.  The  sharpness  of  his  dys- 
peptic constitution  and  irritable  temper  were  sheathed  in  her 
determined  f  culty  of  making  the  best  of  everything.  She  stood 
between  hihi  and  the  world,  with  a  steadfast  guardianship  that 
never  varied.  When  she  was  gone  the  veil  was  removed,  the 
sacred  wall  of  the  house  taken  down,  no  private  outlet  left,  and 
nothing  between  him  and  the  curious  gazer.  Hence  this  revela- 
tion of  pain  and  trouble  which  nobody  but  she,  so  fully  con- 
scious of  his  greatness  yet  so  undazzled  by  it,  could  have  toned 
and  subdued  into  harmony. 

And  yet.  he,  with  the  querulous  bitterness  and  gloom  which 
he  has  here  thrust  upon  us,  in  the  midst  of  all  the  landscapes, 
under  the  clearest  skies ;  and  she,  with  her  keen  wit  and  eyes  1 
which  nothing  escaped,  how  open  they  were  to  all  the  charities ! 
One  day  when  she  came  to  see  me,  I  was  in  great  agitation  and 
anxiety  with  an  infant  just  out  of  a  convulsion  fit.    By  the  next 


214  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

post  after  her  return  I  got  a  letter  from  her,  suggested,  almost 
dictated,  by  Mr.  Carlyle,  to  tell  me  of  a  similar  attack  which  had 
happened  to  a  baby  sister  of  his  some  half  century  before,  and 
which  had  never  recurred— -this  being  the  consolatory  point  and 
meaning  of  the  letter.  Long  after  this,  in  the  course  of  these 
l^st,  melancholy,  and  lonely  years,  I  appealed  to  him  about  a 
project  r  had,  not  knowing  then  how  feeble  he  had  grown.  He 
set  himself  instantly  to  work  to  give  me  the  aid  I  wanted,  and  I 
have  among  my  treasures^a  note  writ  large  in  blue  pencil,  the 
last  instrument  of  writing  which  he  could  use,  after  pen  and  ink 
had  become  impossible,  entering  warmly  into  my  wishes.  These 
personal  circumstances  are  scarcely  matters  to  obtrude  upon  the 
wortd,  and  only  may  be  pardoned  as  the  instances  mostat  hand 
of  a  kind  and  generous  readiness  to  help  and  console. 

It  would  scarcely  be  suitable  to  add  anything  of  a  more  ab- 
stract character  to  such  personal  particulars.  Carlyle*s  work, 
what  it  was,  whether  it  will  stand,  how  much  aid  there  is  to  be 
found  in  it,  has  been  discussed,  and  will  be  discussed,  by  all  who 
are  competent  and  many  who  are  not.  A  writer  whose  whole 
object,  pursued  with  passion  and  with  his  whole  soul,  is  to  pour 
contempt  upon  all  falsehood,  and  enforce  that  "truth  in  the 
inward  parts"  which  is  the  first  of  human  requisites,  how  could 
it  be  that  his  work  should  be  inoperative,  unhelpful  to  man  ? 
The  fashion  of  it  niay  fail  for  the  moment,  a  generation  more 
fond' of  sound  than  meaning  may  be  offended  by  the  "harsher 
accents  and  the  mien  more  grave"  than  suits  their  gentle  fanc)'; 
but  so  long  as  that  remains  the  grand  foundation  of  all  that  is 
possible  for  man,  how  can  the  most  eloquent  and  strenuous  of 
all  its  modern  evangelists  fall  out  of  hearing?  He  had  indeed 
few  doctrines  to  teach  us.  What  his  beliefs  were  no  one  can 
definitely  pronounce ;  they  were  more  perhaps  than  he  thought. 
And  now  he  has  passed  to  where  all  knowledge  is  revealed. 

Mrs.  Oliphant,  in  Macmillan's  Magazine. 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION,  21$ 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION. 

The  general  law  that  like  units  exposed  to  like  forces  tend  ta 
integrate  was  in  the  last  chapter  exemplified  by  the  formation 
of  social  groups.  The  clustering  of  men  who  are  similar  in  kind, 
when  similarly  subject  to  hostile  actions  from  without,  and  sim- 
ilarly reacting  against  them,  we  saw  to  be  the  first  step  in  social 
evolution.  Here  the  correlative  general  law,  that  in  proportion 
as  the  like  units  of  an  aggregate  are  exposed  to  unlike  forces 
they  tend  to  fprm  differentiated  parts  of  the  aggregate,  has  to 
be  observed  in  its  application  to  such  groups,  as  the  second 
step  in  social  evolution. 

The  primary  political  differentiation  originates  from  the  pri- 
mary family  differentiation.  Men  and  women  being  by  the  un- 
Hkcnesses  of  their  functions  in  life  exposed  to  unlike  influences, 
begin  from  the  first  to  assume  unlike  positions  in  the  social 
group  as  they  do  in  the  family  group :  very  early  they  respecr 
tively  form  the  two  political  classes  of  rulers  and  ruled.  And 
how  truly  such  dissimilarity  of  social  positions  as  arises  between 
them  is  caused  by  dissimilarity  in  their  relations  to  surrounding 
actions,  we  shall  see  on  observing  that  the  one  is  small  or  great 
according  as  the  other  is  small  or  great.  When  treating  of  the 
status  of  women  it  was  pointed  out  that  to  a  considerable  degree 
among  the  Chippewayans,  and  to  a  still  greater  degree  among 
the  Clatsops  and  Chinooks,  "  who  live  upon  fish  and  roots, 
which  the  women  are  equally  expert  with  the  men  in  procuring, 
the  former  have  a  rank  and  influence  very  rarely  found  among 
Indians."  We  saw  also  that  in  Cueba,  where  the  women  join 
the  men  in  war,  "  fighting  by  their  side,"  their  position  is  much 
higher  than  usual  among  rude  peoples ;  and.  similarly,  that  in 
Dahomey,  where  the  women  are  as  much  warriors  as  the  men, 
they. are  so  regarded  that,  in  the  f)oHtical  organization,  "the 
woman  is  officially  superior."  On  contrasting  these  exceptional 
cases  with  the  ordinary  cases,  in  which  the  men,  solely  occupied 


tl6  THE   LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

in  war  and  the  chase,  have  unlimited  authority,  while  the  women, 
occupied  in  gathering  miscellaneous  small  food  and  carrj'ing 
burdens,  are  abject  slaves,  it  becomes  manifest  that  diversity  of 
relations  to  surrounding  actions  initiates  diversity  of  social  posi- 
tions. And,  as  we  before  saw,  this  truth  is  further  illustrated  by 
those  few  uncivilized  societies  which  are  habitually  peaceful, 
such  as  the  Bodo  and  Dhimals  of  the  Indian  hills,  and  the 
ancient  Pueblos  of  North  America — societies  in  which  the  occu- 
pations are  not,  or  were  not,  broadly  divi(Jed  into  fighting  and 
working,  and  severally  assigned  to  the  two  sexes;  and  in  which, 
along  with  a  comparatively  small  difference  in  the  activities  of 
the  sexes,  there  goes,  or  went,  small  difference  of  social  status. 

So  is  it  when  we  pass  from  the  greater  or  less  political  difler- 
entiation  which  accompanies  difference  of  sex  to  that  which  is 
independent  of  sex — to  that  which  arises  among  men.  Where 
the  life  is  permanently  peaceful  definite  class  divisions  do  not 
exist.  One  of  the  Indian  hill  tribes  to  which  I  have  frequently 
referred  as  exhibiting  the  honesty,  truthfulness,  and^  amiability 
accompanying  a  purely  industrial  life  may  be  instanced.  Hodg- 
son says,  "  All  Bodo  and  all  Dhimals  are  equal — absolutely  so  in 
right  or  law,  wonderfully  so  in  fact."  The  like  is  said  of  another 
peaceful  and  amiable  hill  tribe:  **The  Lepchas  have  no  caste 
distinctions."  And  among  a  different  race,  the  Papuans,  may 
be  named  the  peaceful  Arafuras  as  displaying  a  "  brotherly  love 
with  one  another,"  and  as  having  no  divisions  of  rank. 

As  at  first  the  domestic  relation  between  the  sexes  passes  into 
apolitical  relation,  such  that  men  and  women  become,  in  mil- 
itant groups,  the  ruling  class  and  the  subject  class,  so  does  the 
relation  between  master  and  slave,  originally  a  domestic  one, 
pass  into  a  political  one  as  fast  as,  by  habitual  war,  the  making 
of  slaves  becomes  general.  It  is  with  the  formation  of  a  slave- 
class  that  there  begins  that  political  differentiation  between  ^he 
regulating  structures  and  the  sustaining  structures  which  con- 
tinues throughout  all  higher  forms  of  social  evolution, 

Kane  remarks  that  "slavery  in  its  most  cruel  form  eiista 


POLITICAL  DI)FFERENTIATIOI^,  217 

among  the  Indians  of  the  whole  coast  from  California  to  Beh- 
ririg's  Straits,  the  stronger  tribes  making  slaves  of  all  the  others 
.  they  can  conquer.  In  the  interior,  where  there  is  but  little 
warfare,  slavery  does  not  exist."  And  this  statement  does  but 
exhibit,  in  a  distinct  form,  the  truth  everywhere  obvious.  Evi- 
dence suggests. that  the  practice  of  enslavement  diverged  by 
small  steps  from  the  practice  of  cannibalism.  Concerning  the 
Nootkas,  we  read  that  •*  slaves  are  occasionally  sacrificed  and 
feasted  upon ;"  and  if  we  contrast  this  usage  with  the  usage 
common  elsewhere,  of  slaying  and  devouring  captives  as  soon 
as  they  are  taken,  we  may  infer  that  the  keeping  of  captives  too 
numerous  to  be  immediately  eaten,  with  the  view  of  eating  them 
subsequently,  leading,  as  it  would,  to  the  employment  of  them 
in  the  meantime,  led  to  the  discovery  that  their  services  might 
be  of  more  value  than  their  flesh,  and  so  initiated  the  habit  of 
preserving  them  as  slaves.  Be  this  as  it  may,  however,  we  find 
that  very  generally  among  tribes  to  which  habitual  militancy 
has  given  some  slight  degree  of  the  appropriate  structure,  the 
enslavement  of  prisoney^^becomes  an  established  habit.  That 
women  and  children  taken  in  war.  and  such  men  as  have  not 
been  slain,  naturally  fall  into  unqualified  servitude,  is  manifest. 
They  belong  absolutely  to  their  captors,  who  might  have  killed 
them,  and  who  retain  the  right  afterward  to  kill  them  if  they 
please.  They  become  property,  of  which  any  use  whatever  may 
be  made. 

The  acquirement  of  slaves,  which  is  at  first  an  incident  of  war, 
becomes  presently  an  object  of  war.  Of  the  Nootkas  we  read 
that  "  some  of  the  smaller  tribes  at  the  north  of  the  island  are 
practically  regarded  as  slave-breeding  tribes,  and  are  attacked 
periodically  by  stronger  tribes;"  and  the  like  happens  among 
the  Chinooks.  It  was  thus  in  ancient  Vera  Paz,  where  period- 
ically they  made  "an  inroad  into  the  enemy's  territory  .... 
and  captured  as  many  as  they  wanted ;"  and  it  was  so  in  Hon- 
duras, where,  in  declaring  war,  they  gave  their  enemies  notice 
"that  they  wanted  slaves."    Similarly  with  various  existing 


2ift  fH^  LiBi^ARY  J^AGA^mE. 

peoples.  St.  John  says  that  "many  of  the  Dyaks  are  tiiort 
desirous  to  obtain  slaves  than  heads,  and  in  attacking  a  village 
kill  only  those  who  resist  or  attempt  to  escape."  And  that  in 
Africa  slave-making  wars  are  common  needs  no  proof. 

The  class-division  thus  initiated  by  war  afterward  maintains 
and  strengthens  itself  in  sundry  ways.  Very  soon  there  begins 
the  custom  of  purchase.  The  Chinooks,  besides  slaves  who 
have  been  captured,  have  slaves  who  were  bought  as  children 
from  their  neighbors ;  and,  as  we  saw  when  dealing  with  the 
•domestic  relations,  the  selling  of  their  children  into  slavery  is 
by  no  means  uncommon  with  savages.  Then  the  slave-class, 
thus  early  enlarged  by  purchase,  comes  afterward  to  be  other- 
wise enlarged.  There  is  voluntary  acceptance  of  slavery  for  the 
sake  of  protection ;  there  is  enslavement  for  debt ;  there  is  en- 
slavement for  crime. 

Leaving  details^  we  need  here  note  only  that  this  political 
differentiation  which  war  begins  is  effected  not  by  the  bodily 
incorporation  of  other  ^c)cieties  or  whole  classes  belonging  to 
other  societies,  but  by  the  incorporation  of  single  members  of 
other  societies,  and  by  like  individual  accretions.  Composed  of 
units  who  are  detached  from  their  original  social  relations  and 
from  one  another  and  absolutely  attached  to  their  owners,  the 
slave-class  is,  at  first,  but  indistinctly  separated  as  a  social 
stratum.  It  acquires  separateness  only  as  fast  as  there  arise 
some  restrictions  on  the  powers  of  the  owners.  Ceasing  to 
stand  in  the  position  of  domestic  cattle,  slaves  begin  to  form  a 
division  of  the  body  politic  when  their  personal  claims  begin  to 
be  distinguished  as  limiting  the  claims  Of  their  masters. 

It  is  commonly  supposed  that  serfdom  arises  by  mitigation  of 
slavery,  but  examination  of  the  facts  shows  that  it  arises  in  a 
different  way.  While  during  the  early  struggles  for  existence 
between  them,  primitive  tribes,  growing  at  one  another's  ex- 
pense by  incorporating  separately  the  individuals  they  capture, 
thus  form  a  class  of  absolute  slaves,  the  formation  of  a  servile 
'^Jass,  eensidcrably  higher  and  having  a  distmct  social  stafms. 


POUTICAL  D/I^PEM^rTlATtON.  tig 

accompanies  that  later  and  larger  process  6f  growth  under 
which  one  society  incorporates  other  societies  bodily.  Serfdoi?i 
originates  along  with  conquest  and  annexation. 

For  whereas  the  one  implies  that  the  captured  people  are 
detached  from  their  homes,  the  other  implies  that  the  subju- 
gated people  continue  in  their  homes.  Thomson  remarks  that 
"among  the  New  Zealanders  whole  tribes  sometimes  became 
Rominally  slaves  when  conquered,  although  permitted  to  live  at 
their  usual  places  of  residence  on  condition  of  paying  tribute  in 
food,  etc." — a  statement  which  shows  the  origin  of  kindred 
arrangements  in  allied  societies.  Of  iht  Sandwich  Islands  gov- 
ernment when  first  known,  described  as  consisting  of  a  king 
with  turbulent  chiefs,  who  had  been  subjected  iif  comparatively 
recent  times,  Ellis  writes:  "The  common  people  are  generally 
considered  as  attached  to  the  soil,  and  are  transferred  with  the 
land  from  one  chief  to  another."  Before  the  late  changes  in 
Feejee  there  w6re  enslaved  districts,  and  of  their  inhabitants  we 
read  that  they  had  to  supply  the  chiefs'  houses  "with  daily  food, 
and  build  and  keep  them  in  repair."  Though  conquered  peoples 
thus  placed  differ  widely  in  the  degrees  of  their  subjection- 
being  at  the  one  extreme,  as  in  Feejee,  liable  to  be  eaten  when 
wanted,  and  at  the  other  extreme  called  on  only  to  give  specified 
proportions  of  produce  or  labor — yet  they  remain  alike  as  being 
undetached  from  their  original  places  of  residence.  That  serf- 
dom in  Europe  originated  in  an  analogous  way  there  is  good 
reason  to  believe.  In  Greece  we  have  the  case  of  Crete,  where, 
under  the  conquering  Dorians,  there  existed  a  vassal  popula- 
tion, formed,  it  would  seem,  partly  of  the  aborigines  and  partly 
of  preceding  conquerors,  of  which  the  first  were  serfs  attached 
to  lands  of  the  state  and  of  individuals,  and  the  others  had  become 
tributary  land-owners.  In  Sparta  the  like  relations  were  estab- 
lished by  like  causes :  there  were  the  helots,  who  lived  on  and 
cultivated  the  lands  of  their  Spartan  masters,  and  the  perioeci, 
who  had  probably  been,  before  the  Dorian  invasion,  the  superior 
class.    So  was  it  also  in  the  Greek  colonies  afterward  founded. 


220         >  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

such  as  Syracuse,  where  the  aborigines  became  serfs. '  SimHarfy 
in  later  times  and  nearer  regions.  When  Gaul  was  overrun  by 
the  Romans,  and  again  when  Romanized  Gaul  was  overrun 
by  the  Franks,  there  was  little  displacement  of  thp  actual  culti- 
vators of  the  soil,  but  these  simply  fell  into  lower  positions  : 
certainly  lower  political  positions,  and  M.  Guizot  thinks  lower 
industrial  positions.  Our  own  country,  too,  furnishes  good  illus- 
trations. In  ancient  British  times,  writes  Pearson,  "it  is  prob- 
able that,  in  parts  at  least,  there  were  servile  villages,  occupie4 
by  a  kindred  but  conquered  race,  the  first  occupants  of  the  soil." 
More  trustworthy,  but  to  the  like  effect,  is  the  evidence  which 
comes  to  us  from  old  English  days  and  Norman  days.  Pro- 
fessor Stubbs  a^ys : 

The  ceorl  had  his  right  in  the  common  land  of  his  township ;  his  Latin  name, 
villanus,  had  been  a  symbol  of  freedom,  but  his  privileges  were  bound  to  the  land, 
and  when  the  Norman  lord  took  the  land  he  took  the  villein  with  it.  Still  the  villein 
ret^ned  his  customary  rights,  his  house  and  land  and  rights  of  wood  and  hay ;  his 
lord's  demesne  depended  for  cultivation  on  his  services,  and  he  had  in  his  lord's 
sense  of  self-ince»'esu  the  sort  of  protection  that  was  shared  by  the  horse  and  the  ox. 

And  of  kindred  import  is  the  following  passage  from  Innes : 

I  have  said  that  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Grange,  the  lowest  in  the  scale  was  the 
ccorl,  bond,  serf,  or  villein,  who  was  transferred  like  the  land  on  which  he  labored, 
and  who  might  be  caught  and  brought  back  if  he  attempted  to  escape,  like  a  stray 
ox  or  sheep.  Their  legal  name  of  netivus,  or  neyf,  which  I  have  not  found  but  in 
Britain,  seems  to  point  to  their  origin  in  the  native  race,  the  original  possessors  of 
the  soil.  ...  In  the  register  of  Dunfermline  are  numerous  '•  genealogies,"  or 
stuU-Vxxiks,  for  enabling  the  lord  to  trace  and  reclaim  his  stock  of  serfs  by  descent. 
It  is  Dbservable  that  most  of  them  are  of  Celtic  names. 

Clearly,  a  subjugated  territory,  useless  without  cultivators, 
was  left  in  the  hands  of  the  original  cultivators  because  nothing 
was  to  be  gained  by  putting  others  in  their  places,  even  coiild 
an  adequate  number  of  others  be  had.  Hence,  while  it  became 
the  conqueror's  interest  to  tie  each  original  cultivator  to  the 
soil,  it  also  became  his  interest  to  let  him  have  such  an  amouQt 
of  produce  as  to  maintain  him  and  enable  him  to  rear  o£[sprii^ 


POLITICAL   DIFFEREN'IIATION,  ^21 

Caiid  also  to  protect  him  against  injuries  which  would  incapaci- 
tate him  for  work. 

To  show  how  fundamental  is  the  distinction  between  bondage 
of  the  primitive  type  and  the  bondage  of  serfdom,  it  needs  but 
to  add  that  while  the  one  can,  and  does,  exist  among  savages 
and  pastoral  tribes,  the  other  becomes  possible  only  after  the 
agricultural  stage  is  reached ;  for  only  then  can  there  occur  the 
bodily  annexation  of  one  society  by  another,  and  only  then  can 
there  be  any  tying  to  the  soil. 

Associated  men  who  live  by  hunting,  and  to  whom  the  area 
occupied  is  of  value  only  as  a  habitat  for  game,  cannot  well  have 
anything  more  than  a  common  participation  in  the  use  of  this 
occupied  area:  such  ownersJiip  of  it  as  they  have  must  be  joint 
ownership.  Naturally,  then,  at  the  outset  all  the  adult  males, 
who  are  at  once  hunters  and  warriors,  are  the  common  posses- 
sors of  the  undivided  land,  encroachment  on  which  by  other 
tribes  they  resist.  Though,  in  the  earlier  pastoral  state,  espe- 
cially where  the  barrenness  of  the  region  involves  wide  disper- 
sion, there  is  no  definite  proprietorship  of  the  tract  wandered 
over ;  yet,  as  is  shown  us  in  the  strife  between  the  herdsmen  of 
Abraham  and  those  of  Lot  respecting  feeding  grounds,  some 
claims  to  exclusive  use  tend  to  arise ;  and  at  a  later  half-pastoral 
stage,  as  among  the  ancient  Germans,  the  wanderings  of  each 
division  fall  within  prescribed  limits.  I  refer  to  these  facts  by 
way  of  showing  the  identity  established  at  the  outset  between 
the  militant  class  and  the  land-owning  class.  For,  whether  the 
group  is  one  which  lives  by  hunting  or  one  which  lives  by  feed- 
ing cattle,  any  slaves  its  members  possess  are  excluded  from 
land-ownership :  the  free-men,  who  are  all  fighting  men,  become 
as  a  matter  of  course  the  proprietors  of  their  territory.  This 
connection,  in  variously  modified  forms,  long  continues  through 
subsequent  stages  of  social  evolution,  and  could  scarcely  do 
otherwise.  Land  being,  in  early  settled  communities,  the  almost 
exclusive  source  of  wealth,  it  happens  inevitably  that  during 
times  ift  which  the  principle  that^might  is  right  remains  unqual- 


222  THE  LIBRARY  MAQAZINE. 

ified,  personal  power  and  possession  of  land  go  together.  Hence 
the  fact  that  where,  instead  of  being  held  by  the  whole  society, 
land  comes  to  be  parceled  out  among  component  village  com- 
munities, or  among  families,  or  among  individuals,  possession 
of  it  habitually  goes  along  with  the  bearing  of  arms.  In  ancient 
Egypt,  "every  soldier  was  a  land-owner" — "had  an  allotment  of 
land  of  about  six  acres."  In  Greece  the  invading  Hellenes, 
wresting  the  soil  from  its  original  holders,  joined  military  ser- 
vice with  the  land-ownership.  In  Rome,  tpo,  "every  freeholder 
from  the  seventeenth  to  the  sixtieth  year  of  his  age,  was  under 
obligation  of  service  ...  so  that  even  the  emancipated  slave 
had  to  serve  who,  in  an  exceptional  case,  had  come  into  posses- 
sion of  landed  property."  The  like  happened  in  the  early  Teu- 
tonic community.  Joined  with  professional  warriors,  its  army 
included  "  the  mass  of  freemen  arranged  in  families  fighting  for 
their  homesteads  and  hearths ;"  such  freemen  or  markmen  own- 
ing land  partly  in  common  and  partly  as  individual  proprietors. 
Similarly  with  the  ancient  English.  "  Their  occupation  of  the 
land  as  cognationes  resulted  from  their  enrollment  in  the  field, 
where  each  kindred  was  drawn  up  under  an  officer  of  its  own 
lineage  and  appointment;"  and  so  close  was  this  dependence 
that  "a  thane  forfeited  his  hereditary  freehold  by  misconduct  in 
battle." 

Beyond  the  original  connection  between  militancy  and  land- 
owning, which  naturally  arises  from  the  joint  interest  which 
those  who  own  the  land  and  occupy  it,  either  individually  or 
collectively,  have  in  resisting  aggressors,  there  arises  later  a  fur- 
ther connection.  As,  along  with  successful  militancy,  there 
progresses  a  social  evolution  which  gives  to  a  dominant  ruler 
increased  power,  it  becomes  his  custom  to  reward  his  leading 
soldiers  by  grants  of  land..  Early  Ec:vptian  kings  "bestowed  on 
distinguished  military  officers"  portions  of  the  crown  domains. 
When  the  barbarians  were  enrolled  as  Roman  soldiers,  "they 
were  paid  also  by  assignments  of  land,  according  to  a  custom 
which  prevailed  in  the  imperial  armies.    The  possession  of  these 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION,  t^% 

kinds  was  given  to  them  on  condition  of  the  sOn  becoming  a 
soldier  like  his  father."  And  that  kindred  usages  were  general 
throughout  the  feudal  period  is  a  familiar  truth  :  feudal  tenancy 
being,  indeed,  thus  constituted ;  and  inability  to  bear  arms  being 
a  reason  for  excluding  women  from  succession.  To  exemplify 
the  nature  of  the  relation  established,  it  will  suffice  to  name  the 
fects  that  "  William  the  Conqueror  . .  .  distributed  this  kingdom 
into  about  60,000  parcels,  of  nearly  equal  value,  from  each  of 
which  the  service  of  a  soldier  was  due,"  and  that  one  of  his  laws 
requires  all  owners  of  land  to  "swear  that  they  become  vassals 
or  tenants."  and  will  "  defend  their  lord's  territories  and  title  as 
well  as  his  person"  by  '•  knight  service  on  horseback." 

That  this  original  relation  between  land-owning  and  militancy 
long  survived,  we  are  shown  by  the  armorial  bearings  of  county 
families,  as  well  as  by  their  portraits  of  ancestors,  who  are  mostly 
represented  in  military  costume. 

Setting  out. with  the  class  of  warriors,  or  men  bearing  arms, 
who  in  primitive  communities  are*  owners  of  the  land,  collec- 
tively or  individually,  or  partly  one  and  partly  the  other,  there 
arises  the  question,  How  does  this  class  differentiate  into  nobles 
Jlnd  freemen? 

The  most  general  reply  is,  of  course,  that  since  the  state  of 
homogeneity  is  by  necessity  unstable,  time  inevitably  brings 
about  inequality  of  positions  among  those  whose  positions  wer6 
at  first  equal.  Before  the  semi-civilized  state  is  reached  the  dif- 
ferentiation cannot  become  decided,  becpuse  there  can  be  no 
large  accumulations  of  wealth,  and  because  the  laws  of  descent 
do  not  favor  maintenance  of  such  accumulations  as  are  possible* 
But  in  the  pastoral  and  still  more  in  the  agricultural  commu- 
nity, especially  where  descent  through  males  has  been  estab- 
lished, several  causes  of  differentiation  come  into  play.  There 
is  first  that  of  unlikeness  of  kinship  to  the  head  man.  Obvi- 
ously, in  course  of  generations,  the  younger  descendants  of 
the  younger  become  more  and  more  remotely  related  tO 
the  eldest   descendant  of   the  eldest,  and    social    inferiority 


2.?4  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.    ^ 

arises:  as  the  obligation  to  execute  blood-revenge  for  a 
murdered  member  of  the  family  does  not  extend  beyond 
a  certain  degree  of  relationship  (in  ancient  France  not  beyond 
the  seventh),  so  neither  does  the  accompanying  distinction. 
From  the  same  cause  comes  inferiority  in  point  of  posses* 
sions.  Inheritance  by  the  eldest  male  from  generation  to  gen- 
eration, brings  about  the  result  that  those  who  are  the  most 
distantly  connected  in  blood  with  the  head  of  the  grodpare  also 
the  poorest.  And  then  there  co-operates  with  these  factors  a 
consequent  factor ;  namely,  the  extra  power  which  the  greater 
wealth  gives.  For  when  there  arise  disputes  within  the  lribe» 
the  ridier  arc  those  who,  by  their  better  appliances  for  defense 
and  their  greater  ability  to  purchase  aid,  naturally  have  the 
advantage  over  the  poorer.  Proof  that  this  is  a  potent  cause  is 
found  in  a  fact  named  by  Sir  Henry  Maine:  "The  founders  of  a 
part  of  our  modern  European  aristocracy,  the  Danish,  are  known 
to  have  been  originally  peasants  who  fortified  their  houses  dur- 
ing deadly  village  struggles*  and  then  used  their  advantage." 
Such  superiorities  of  power  and  position  once  initiated,  are 
increased  in  another  way.  Already  in  the  last  chapter  we  have 
seen  that  communities  are  to  a  certain  extent  increased  by  the 
addition  of  fugitives  from  other  communities — sometimes  crim- 
inals, sometimes  those  who  are  oppressed.  While,  in  places 
where  such  fugitives  belong  to  races  of  superior  type,  they  often 
become  rulers  (as  among  many  Indian  hill-tribes,  whose  rajahs 
are  of  Hindoo  extraction),  in  places  where  they  are  of  the  same 
race,  and  cannot  do  this,  they  attach  themselves  to  those'of 
chief  power  in  their  adopted  tribe.  Sometimes  they  yield  up 
their  freedom  for  the  sake  of  protection :  a  man  will  make  him- 
self a  slave  by  breaking  a  spear  in  the  presence  of  his  wished- 
for-master,  as  among  the  East  Africans,  or  by  inflicting  some 
small  bodily  injury  upon  him,  as  among  the  Fulahs.  And  in 
ancient  Rome  the  semi-slave  class  distinguished  as  clients,  orig^ 
inated  by  this  voluntary  acceptance  of  servitude  with  safety. 
But  where  his  aid  promises  to  be  of  value  as  a  warrior,  the  fugi^ 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION,  22$ 

tnre  offers  himself  in  that  capacity  in  exchange  for  maintenarce 
aiid  refuge.  Other  things  equal,  he  joins  hinreeii  to  some  one 
marked  by  superiority  of  power  and  property,  and  thus  enables 
the  man  already  dominant  to  become  more  dominant.  Such 
armed  dependents,  having  as  aliens  no  claims  to  the  lands  of  the 
group,  and  bound  to  its  head  only  by  fealty,  answer  in  position 
to  the  comites  as  found  in  the  early  German  communities,  and 
as  exemplified  in  old  English  times  by  the  "  huscarlas"  (house- 
cArls),  with  whom  nobles  surrounded  thenr.selves.  Evidently, 
too,  followers  of  this  kind,  having  certain  interests  in  common 
with  their  protector,  and  no  interests  in  common  with  the  rest 
of  the  community,  become,  in  his  hands,  the  means  of  usurping 
communal  rights  and  elevating  himself  while  depressing  the 
rest. 

Step  by  step  the  contrast  strengthens.  Beyond  such  as  have 
voluntarily  made  themselves  slaves  to  a  head  man,  others  have 
become  enslaved  by  capture  in  the  wars  meanwhile  going  on, 
others  by  staking  themselves  in  gaming,  others  by  purchase, 
others  by  crime,  others  by  debt.  And  of  necessity  the  posses- 
sion of  many  slaves,  habitually  accompanying  wealth  and  power, 
tends  still  further  to  increase  that  wealth  and  power,  and  to  mark 
of!  still  more  the  higher  rank  from  the  lower. 

Certain  concomitant  influences  generate  differences  of  nature, 
ph)rsical  and  mental,  between  those  members  of  a  community 
who  have  attained  superior  positions,  and  those  who  have  re- 
mained inferior.  Unlikenesses  of  status  once  initiated,  lead  to 
unlikenesses  of  life,  which,  by  the  constitutional  changes  they 
work,  presently  make  the  unlikenesses  of  status  more  difficult  to 
alter. 

First  there  comes  difference  of  diet  and  its  effects.  In  the 
habit,  common  among  primitive  tribes,  of  letting  the  women 
subsist  on  the  leavings  of  the  men,  and  in  the  accompanying 
habit  of  denying  to  the  younger  men  certain  chcice  viands  which 
the  older  men  eat,  we  see  exemplified  the  inevitable  proclivity 
of  the  strong  to  feed  themselves  at  the  expense  of  the  weak ;  and 
L.  M.  8.-8 


226  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

when  there  arise  class-divisions,  there  habitually  results  better 
nutrition  of  the  superior  than  of  the  inferior.  Forster  remarks 
that  in  the  Society  Islands  the  lower  classes  often  suffer  from  a 
scarcity  of  food  which  never  extends  to  the  upper  classes.  In 
the  Sandwich  Islands  the  flesh  of  such  animals  as  they  have  is 
eaten  principally  by  the  c  hiefs.  Of  caiinibalism  among  the  Feejee- 
ans,  Seeman  says :  "  the  common  people  throughout  the  group, 
as  well  as  women  of  all  classes,  were  by  custom  debarred  from 
it."  These  instances  sufficiently  indicate  thfe  contrast  that  evety^ 
where  arises  between  the  diets  of  the  ruling  few  and  of  the  sub- 
ject many.  And  then  by  such  differences  of  diet,  and  accompa- 
nying differences  in  clothing,  shelter,  and  strain  on  the  energies 
are  eventually  produced  physical  differences.  Of  the  Feejeeans  m^e 
read  that  "the  chiefs  are  tall,  well  made,  and  muscular;  while 
the  lower  orders  manifest  the  meagerness  arising  from  laborious 
service  and  scanty  nourishment."  The  chiefs  among  the  Sand- 
wich Islanders  "  are  tall  and  stout,  and  their  personal  appearance 
is  so  much  superior  to  that  of  the  common  people,  that  some 
have  imagined  them  a  distinct  race."  Ellis,  verifying  Cook,  says 
of  the  Tahitians,  that  the  chiefs  are,  "almost  without  exception, 
as  much  superior  to  the  peasantry  ...  in  physical  strength  as 
they  are  in  rank  and  circumstances ;"  and  Erskine  notes  a  par- 
allel contrast  among  the  Tongans.  That  the  like  holds ^mong 
the  African  races  may  be  inferred  from  Reade's  remark  that — 

The  court  lady  is  tall  and  elegant ;  her  skin  smooth  and  transparent ;  her  beauty 
has  stamina  and  longevity.  The  girl  of  the  middle  classes,  so  frequently  pretty,  is 
very  often  short  and  coarse,  and  soon  becomes  a  matron  ;  while,  if  you  desccn;!  to 
the  lower  classes,  you  will  find  good  looks  rare,  and  the  figure  angular,  stunted, 
sometimes  almost  deformed.*  ~~ 

Simultaneously  there  arise  between  the  ruling  and  subject 
classes,  unlikenesses  of  bodily  activity  and  skill.  Occupied,  as 
those  of  higher  rank  commonly  are.  in  the  chase  when  not  occt 

*  While  writing  I  find  in  the  recently  issued  "  Transactions  of  the  Anthropolog- 
ical Institute"  proof  that,  even  now  in  England,  the  professional  classes  are  both 
taller  and  beavter  than  the  artisan  classes. 


N* 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIA  TION. '  22/ 

pied  in  war,  they  have  a  life-long  discipline  of  a  kind  conducive 
to  various  physical  superiorities;  while,  contrariwise,  those 
occupied  in  agriculture,  in  carrying  of  burdens,  and  in  other 
drudgeries,  partially  lose  what  agility  and  address  they  naturally 
had.     Class-predominance  is,  therefore,  thus  further  facilitated. 

And  then  there  are  the  respective  mental  traits  produced  by 
^ily  exercise  of  power,  and  by  daily  submission  to  power.  Th$ 
ideas,  and  "sentiments,  and  modes  of  behavior,  perpetually  re- 
peated, generate  on  one  side  an  inherited  fitness  for  command, 
and  on  the  other  side  an  inherited  fitness  for  obedience ;  with 
the  result  that  in  course  of  time  there  arises  on  both  sides  the 
belief  that  the  established  relations  of  classes  are  the  natural 
ones. 

By  implying  habitual  war  among  settled  societies,  the  fore- 
going interpretations  have  implied  the  formation  of  compound 
societies.  The  rise  of  such  class-divisions  as  have  been  de- 
scribed, is  therefore  complicated  by  the  rise  of  further  class- 
divisions  determined  by  the  relations  from  time  to  time  estab- 
lished between  those  conquerors  and  conquered  whose  respective 
groups  already  contain  class-divisions. 

This  increasing  differentiation  which  accompanies  increasing 
integration,  is  clearly  seen  in  certain  semi-civilized  societies, 
such  as  that  of  the  Sandwich  Islanders.  Ellis  enumerates  their 
ranks  as : 

I,  King,  queens,  and  royal  family,  along  with  the  councilor  or  chief  minister  of 
the  king.  2.  The  govenK>rs  of  the  different  islands,  and  the  chiefs  of  several  large 
divisions.  M«my  of  these  are  descendants  of  those  who  were  kings  of  the  respective 
islands  in  Cook's  time,  and  until  subdued  by  T-amehameha.  3.  Chiefs  of  districts 
or  villages  who  pay  a  regular  rent  for  the  land,  cultivating  it  by  means  of  their 
dependents,  or  letting  it  out  to  tenants.  This  rank  includes  also  the  ancient  priests. 
4.  The  laboring  classes — those  renting  small  portions  of  land,  those  working  on  the 
land  for  food  and  clothing,  mechanics,  musicians,  and  dancers. 

And,  as  shown  by  other  passages,  the  laboring  classes  here 

grouped  together  are  divisible   into— artisans,  who  are  paid 

!    wages ;    serfs,  attached  to  the  soil ;   and   slaves.    Inspection 

makes  it  tojerably  dear  that  the  lowest  chiefs,  once  independ-* 


228  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ent,  were  reduced  to  the  second  rank  when  adjacent  chiefs 
conquered  them  and  became  local  kings ;  and  that  they  were 
reduced  to-  the  third  rank  at  the  same  time  that  these  local 
kings  became  chiefs  of  the  second  rank,  when,  by  conquest,  a 
kingship  of  the  whole  group  was  established.  Other  societies 
in  kindred  stages  show  us  kindred  divisions  similarly  to  be 
accounted  for.  Among  the  New  Zealanders  there  are  six  grades; 
there  are  six  among  the  Ashantees ;  there  are  five  among  the 
Abyssinians;  and  other  more  or  less  compounded  African  States 
present  analogous  divisions.  Perhaps  ancient  Peru  furnishes 
as  clear  a  case  as  any  of  the  superposition  of  ranks  resulting 
from  subjugation.  The  petty  kingdoms  which  were  massed 
together  by  the  conquering  Yncas,  were  severally  left  with  the 
rulers  and  their  subordinates  undisturbed;  but  over  the  whole 
empire  there  was  a  superior  organization  of  Ynca  rulers  of  vari- 
ous grades.  That  kindred  causes  produced  kindred  effects  in 
early  Egyptian  times,  is  inferable  from  traditions  and  remains 
which  tell  us  both  of  local  struggles  which  ended  in- consolida- 
tion, and  of  conquests  by  invading  races ;  whence  would  natu- 
rally result  the  numerous  divisions  and  subdivisions  which 
Egyptian  society  presented :  an  inference  justified  by  the  fact 
that,  under  Roman  dominion,  there  was  a  recomplication  caused 
by  superposing  of  Roman  governing  agencies  upon  native  gov- 
erning agencies.  Passing  over  other  ancient  instances,  and 
coming  to  the  familiar  case  of  our  own  country,  we  may  note 
how,  from  the  followers  of  the  conquering  Norman,  there  arose 
the  two  ranks  of  the  greater  and  lesser  barons,  holding  their 
land  directly  from  the  king,  while  the  old  English  thanes  were 
reduced  to  the  rank  of  sub  feudatories.  Of  course,  where  {per- 
petual wars  produce,  first,  small  aggregations,  and  then  larger 
ones,  and  then  dissolutions,  and  then  reaggregations,  and  then 
unions  of  them,  various  in  their  extents,  as  happened  in  mediae- 
val Europe,  there  result  very  numerous  divisions.  In  the  Mero- 
vingian kingdoms  there  were  slaves  having  seven  diiTerent 
origins ;  there  were  serfs  of  more  than'  one  grade ;  there  were 


'POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION.  229 

frjeedmen — men  who,  though  emancipated,  did  not  rank  with 

the  fully  free;  and  there  were  two  other  classes  less  than  free— 
the  liten  and  the  coloni.  Of  the  free  there  were  three  classes — 
independent  land-owners;  freemen  in  relations  of  dependence 
with  other  freemen,  of  whom  there  were  two  kinds ;  and  free- 
men in  special  relations  with  the  king,  of  whom  there  were  three 
kinds. 

And  here,  while  observing  in  these  various  cases  how  greater 
political  differentiation  is  made  possible  by  greater  political 
integration,  we  may  also  observe  that  in  early  stages,  while 
social  cohesion  is  small,  greater  political  integration  is  made 
possible  by  greater  political  differentiation.  For  the  larger  the 
mass  to  be  held  together,  while  incoherent,  the  more  numerous 
must  be  the,  agents  standing  in  successive  degrees  of  subordina- 
tion to  hold  it  together. 

The  political  differentiations  which  militancy  originates,  and 
which  for  a  long  time  acquire  increasing  definiteness,  so  that 
intermi>xture  of  ranks  by  marriage  is  made  a  crime,  are  at  later 
stages,  and  under  other  conditions,  interfered  with,  traversed, 
and  partially  or  wholly  destroyed. 

Where,  throughout  long  periods  and  in  ever- varying  degrees, 
war  has  been  producing  aggregations  and  dissolutions,  the  con- 
tinual breaking  up  and  reforming  of  social  bonds  obscures  the 
original  divisions  established  in  the  ways  described :  instance 
the  state  of  things  in  the  Merovingian  kingdoms  juct  named. 
And  where,  instead  of  conquests  by  kindred  adjacent  societies, 
which  in  large  measure  leave  standing  the  social  positions  and 
properties  of  the  subjugated,  there  are  conquests  by  alien  races 
carried  on  more  barbarously,  the  original  grades  may  be  prac- 
tically obliterated,  and,  in  place  of  them,  there  may  arise  grades 
originating  entirely  by  appointment  of  the^despotic  conqueror. 
In  parts  of  the  East,  where  such  over-runnings  of  race  by  race 
have  teen  going  on  from  the  earliest  recorded  times,  we  see  this 
state  of  things  substantially  realized  :  there  is  little  or  nothing 
of.  hereditary  rank,  and  the  only  rank  recognized  is  that  of  ofii- 


.^3^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,    . 

cial  position*  Besides  the  different  grades  of  appointed  state- 
functionaries,  there  are  no  class-distinctions,  or  none  having 
political  meanings. 

A  tendency  to  subordination  of  the  original  ranks,  and  a  sub- 
stitution of  new  ranks,  is  otherwise  caused :  it  accompanies  the 
progress  of  political  consolidation.  The  change  which  has  oc- 
curred in  China  well  illustrates  this  effect.    Gutzlaff  says : 

Mere  title  was  afterward  (on  the  decay  of  the  feudal  system)  the  reward  bestowed 
by  the  sovereign  .  .  .  and  the  haughty  and  powerful  grandees  of  other  countries  are 
here  the  dependent  and  penurious  servants  of  the  Crown.  .   .   .   The  revolutionary 

principle  of  leveling  all  classes  has  been  carried,  in  China,  to  a  very  great  extent 

This  is  introduced  for  the  benefit  of  the  sovereign,  to  render  his  authority  supreme. 

The  causes  of  such  changes  are  not  difficult  to  see.  In  the 
first  place,  the  subjugated  local  rulers,  losing,  as  integration 
advances,  more  and  more  of  their  power,  lose,  consequently, 
more  and  more  of  their  actual,  if  not  of  their  nominal,  rank — 
passing  from  the  condition  of  tributary  rulers  to  the  condition 
of  subjects.  Indeed,  jealousy  on  the  part  of  the  monarch 
sometimes  prompts  positive  exclusion  of  them  from  influential 
positions :  as  in  France,  where  "  Louis  XIV.  systematically 
excluded  the  nobility  from  ministerial  functions."  Presently 
their  distinction  is  further  diminished  by  the  rise  of  competing 
ranks  created  by  state  authority.  Instead  of  the  titles  inher- 
ited by  the  land-possessing  military  chiefs,  which  were  descrip- 
tive of  their  attributes  and  positions,  there  come  to  be  titles 
conferred  by  the  sovereign.  Certain  of  the  classes  thus  estab* 
lished  are  still  of  militant  origin :  as  the  knights  made  on  the 
battlefield,  sometimes  in  large  numbers  before  battle,  as  at 
Agincourt,when  five  hundred  were  thus  created,  and  sometimes 
afterward  in  reward  for  valor.  Others  of  them  arise  from  the 
exercise  of  political  functions  of  different  grades  :  as  in  France, 
"jvhere,  in  the  seventeenth  century,  hereditary  nobility  was  con- 
ferred on  officers  of  the  great  council  and  officers  of  the  cham- 
ber of  accounts — officers  who  had  habitually  been  of  bourgeois 
extraction.  ^  The  admmistration  of  law,  too,  presently  Originates 


POLITICAL  DIFFERENTIATION,  2%X 

tfUes'of  honor.     In  France,  in  1607,  nobility  was  granted  to  doc- 
tors, regents,  and  professors  of  law;  and  "the  superior  courts 
obtained,  in  1644,  the  privileges  Of  nobility  of  the  first  degree." 
So  that,  as  Warn  keen  tgf' remarks,  ^'the  original  conception  of 
Bobilky  was  !a  the  course  of  time  so  niuc  •  wfdened  that  its 
primitive  rd«tioo  to  the  possession  of  a  I'ef  is  no  longer  recog- 
nizable, and  the  whole  institution  &eems' changc(!/'  'These,  with 
kindred  instances^  which  our  own  country  and  other  European 
countries^  furmsh,  «how  ulf  both  how  the  original  dass-divisipns 
become  blurred,  and  how  the  new  class-dh^isioiis  arc  distin- 
guished by  bemgd€-k)cali2e^.-'  Thsy  are  strata  which  run  through 
the  integrated  society,  having,  many  of  them,  no  reference  to 
the  land,  and  nO  more  connfectiori  with  on^  place  than  another. 
his  Crtie  that  of  the' titles  artificially  conferred,  the  higher  are* 
habitually  derived  from  the  names  of  districts  and  towns :  so ' 
shnolatlng,-  but  only'^lmulating,  thfe  ancient  feudal  titles  expres- 
sire  of  actual  lords h?|)  over  territor?es.  The  ot'her  modern  titles, 
bowierer,  which  4yave  arisen  with  't'he  gro\nh  of  political,  jiidi- 
cial,«and  -bther  fuftdtlbns,  have' not  even?  nominal  tefer^nces  to  ' 
locaikiesr.-     This  change  naturally  afccompanies  the  growing' 
iotegration  of' t;h<^  parts  intb  a  whole,  and  the  rise  of  an  oi^^ani-  ' 
zatiori  of :^he'wh»ld  which  didiiegardi  the  divisfioHsf  adnong  the  ' 
parts.         -  '      ''f  .■  ■"   '"  :  '       ■  -  ^"■'      ■■''■•.' 

More  effbctlve  still  in  weakfening  those  primitive  political 
dfvtstons  initiated  by  militancy,  is  increasing  industrialism. 
Thisactd  ki  two  ways — firstly:  by  creating  a  class  haying  power  ' 
derived  otherwise  than-  from  territorial  possessions  or  official 
position;  andv  secondly;  by  generating  ideas  and  sentiments  at 
variance  wi tit  the  ancient  asstimptkm^  of  class-superiority.  As 
we ihavft  already .seien.  rank  and'wealth  are'at  the  outset  habitu- 
ally associated.  Existing  uncivilized'  people  stHl  show  us  this 
rclsabn.  The^  chief  oi  a  kraal  among  the  Koranna  Hottentots 
is  'f  usually  the  person  of  'greatest  property."  In  the  Bechuani 
language  "  the  word  kosi  .  .  .  has  a  double  acceptation,  denot- 
ing ei^^  -a  dvief  oi"  a 'rich  «ian."    Such  small  authority  aS  a 


Z32  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Chinook  chief  has  "  rests  on  riches^  which  <ons«at8  In  ixvives, 
children,  slaves,  boats,  and  shells."  So  it  was  oriffinftlly  in 
Europe.  In  ancient  Spain  the  title  ricos  hombres,  applied  to 
the  barons,  definitely  ideatified  the  two  attributes.  Isdced 
it  is  manifest  that  before  the;  development  of  cointiicrce,  aed 
while  possession  of  land  could  ak>ae  ^ive.  h^'geitesb  of  means, 
lordship  and  riches  w^re  direptly  connected;,  so  that,  as  Sir 
Henry  Maine  remarks,  ,"rt»e  oppositton  comoDOitly  set  up  be- 
tween birth  apd  we^kh.  ^ihI  paiticulariy  .wealth  other,  than 
landed  property,  is  entirely  modern."  Whdn,  howcYer,*witb  the 
arrival  of  industry  at  that  3t|ige  in  wjjich  wh^teale  transactions 
b^ing  large  profits,  thore  ^rise  graders  wlhp  vie  with,. and  exceed, 
many  of  the  landed  nobility  ia  woal^lv,  and  w-J^en  by  coaferring 
obligations  on  kings  and  nob)es«  ^ch  tr^^er^rg^in  ao^^l  tnfiu- 
ence,  there  comes  an  occasional  jremoval  of  ^he  4)af  rier  betHcen 
them  and  the  titled  classes.  In  France  4he  progtess  ^gao  as 
early  as  1 271,  when  there  were  issucjd  Juters  eiinpbliog  Reoul 
the  goldsmith — "tlie  fir^t  letters  conferring  ttoMity  inexist- 
epce.**  The  precedent  pw^  established .  is  ^fOiUowed  wifck  inorete- 
ing  frequency,  and  .sometimes^  uinler  pressure  of  fitidncial  ncecte, 
there  grows  up  the  practice  of  selling  titles«iii  disguised  ways  or 
openly :  in  France,  in.  1703,  th^  king  ea«Obled  two^undred  per- 
sons at  three  thousand  livres  a  head  ;  in  1706,  five  hundred  at 
six  thousand.  And  thcQ  the  bre^l^in^  dOwn  of  the  ancient 
political  divisions  thus  caused  is  furthered  by  that  weakenttig 
of  them  consequent  on  the  growing  fi^pirit  of  equality  fostered 
hy  industrial  life.  In  proportion  as  men  are  daily  haibituated  to 
maintain  their  own  claims  while  respecting  the  claims  of  ethers, 
w.iich  they  do  in  every  act  of  exchange,  whether  of  goods  for 
money  or  of  services  for  pay,  there  is  produced  a  mcntaJ  atti- 
tude at  variance  with  that  wiiich  accompatii^  subjection ;  and, 
as  fast  as  this  happ  ns,  sqch  political  diatiiiction^  as  imply  sub- 
jection lose  more  and  more  of  that  respect  which  gives  them 
strength. 
Class-distinctions,  then,  date  bac)c  to  ih.e  );^imliigs  d  social 


PO£tTI€AL  LhlFPERENTIATWN',  233 

Hffe.  Omitting  those  smaU  wamtering  assemblages  which  are  so 
incoherent  thAt  their  component  parts  are  ever  changing  their  re- 
lations to  one  another  and  to  the  environment,  we  see  that  wher- 
ever there  is  some  coherence  and  some  permanence  of  relation: 
among  the  parts,  there  begin  to  arise  political  divisions.  Rela- 
tive superiority  of  power,  first  causmg  a  differentiation  at  once 
domestic  and  social,  between  the  activities  and  po^kions  of  the 
sisxes.  presently  begins  to  cause  a  diffei^entfeition  among  males, 
shown  in  the  bondage  of  captives:  a  o^aster-class  and  a  slave- 
fclass  are  formed. 

Where  men  continue  the  wandering  l?fe  ?n  pursiiit  of  wild 
food  for  themselves  or  their  cattle,  the  groups  they  form  are 
debarrefd  from  doing  niore  by  war  than  appropriate  one  anoth- 
cfr's  umts-  individtialty;  but  where  men  hax'e  parsed  Into  the 
agricultural  or  settled  state,  it  becomes  possible  lor  one  com- 
Inunrty  to  take  possession  bodily  of  another  community,  along 
With  the  terrhory  it  occupies.  When  this  happens  there  arise 
additional  dass-divisk>ns.  The  conquered  and  tribute-paying 
conimunity,  besides  having  its  Iteadmen  induced  to  subjection, 
ha»  its  pe6ple  reduced  to  a  state  su<ih  that,  while  thejr  continue 
to  Hve  on  their  l2^ids,4hey  yield  up,  thrdugh  the  ihtermedtation 
of  their  chiefs,  part  of  the  produce  to  the  conqueror^ :  so  fore- 
ehf^ufowing  what  eventu^ly  becot)ie&  a  eet^-cli^. 

From  the  bcgkm«ftg  the  n^litant  ciasi^,  being  by  terfee  of  afms 
the  domkianH  el^s,- beeonlte^  tfoe  da^  whkh  owns  the  source  of 
food-^h*  land.  During  the  hutitiog  and  past<)r&t  stages,  the 
warriors  of  the  group  hold  the*  land  collectively.  On  passing 
into  the  settled  state  their  tenures  become  partly  collective  and 
partly  irtdlVidual  in  sundry  ways,  and  eventually  almost  wholly 
individua^.  But  throughout  long  stagte  of  social  evolution, 
land-owning  and  militancy  continoe  to  be  associated. 

The  clasB-differentfation  of  which  iiaiflflaiKry  is  the  active  cause 
lft^itrtl»^red  by  the  estaWishinaent  of  d<3finiiie  descem,  and  espe* 
cially  «tade<lescent,  and  the  transmission  of  pofeftion  and  prop^ 
•ac^to^s^  ekkst  acxi  of  the  eld^t  cpnttntMdfyv    Tbi^  eonidtic^A 


234  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

to  inequalities  of  position  and  wealth  between  near  kindred  and 
remote  kindred ;  and  such  inequalities  of  weakU'Once  initiated, 
strefigthen  themselves  by  giving  to  the  superior,  increased  ipeans 
of  maintaining  their  power,  by.  accumulating  appiiancos  (or 
offepse  and  defease.      .  ,  •    :     ■  .  ^ 

Such  diifler^tiationisi  increased  at  the  ^aine  tin^je  ;ha^  ^.  q^w 
differen^iatipa  is  init^ated,/by  ^he  in?fpigra^iqn  pf  {ugitiy^.ttihp 
attach  th^n^elves  to  the  ipq^t.powerlul  uwjml^r  of  thegi^oup.; 
now.  a^,  dependents,  who^.wprk,  ^nd  now  as  ^med.foUowers— r 
armed  followers  who  form  a  class  bound  to  tliq  domifiant  man 
and  uncpnnecjt^ed  with  the  land^  And  since,  in  clusters  pf  ^uch 
groups,  fugitives  ordinarily  flpqk  most  tp,  the  strongest^  gro^up^ 
and  become  adherents  of  its  liea4»  they  ^rje,  instf  umentfd  in  fur- 
thering, those  §ubs^uent. integrations  and  ^iflerfsptiati^as  which 
conquests  bri^g.ahpwtj  ,  ,     ,  i  ...  . 

Ingquajiitijes  of  ^o^ial  position,  bring^ig  inequalities  ip^the  supr 
pli(^^  and  kinds  of  {ood,  clothifig»  and  ^ch^Jter,  tend  xp  est^lr^lis^ 
physgical  di^^nces,  ^9  the  further  adyap;tdge  pi  the  rulqrs  ^4 
disadvantage  of  the  rul^*  ,.An^  beyond  tl^e.physiqal differences 
there iare  pro^u.ced  by  the, respective  Ijabiis.qf  di(€  wen^al  differr 
ences»  en^otional  and  inteUectual,  streqgtheoii>g  the  gei^^al  oon^ 
trasii  of  nature,  .  ,  ;    ., 

When  there  come  the  conquests  which  produce  compoun4 
societies,  and,  again,  dqnbly  compound  ones,  there  coni^  super- 
positions <A  ranks.  And  the  general  effect  is.that,,whil^  the 
ranks  of.  the  conqujering  society  become  respectively  higher  than 
those  which  existed  before,  those  of  the  conquer^  become 
respectively,  lower,  *         :       , 

The  class-divisions  thMsi  formed,  dudng  the  eajrlier  stages  of 
militancy,  are  traversed  and  obscured  as  fast  as  the  niany  emaU 
societies  are  coftsolidatedihita  cdjc  laq^e  society.  Ranlw  refers 
rin^  to  local  OTga;niaation  arc  graduaUy  replaced  by  Tanks  refer- 
ring to  general  organization*  InsUiedd  of  deputy  and  enb^Jdeptity 
governing  agenta  who  are^the  militant  owners  of  the  subdwisfons 
they  rule,  thcfire  come  governing  agents  who  more  or  less  dear] 


1 


POLITICAL  BIFFERENTIATION-.  235 

form  strata  running  throughout  the  society  as  a  whole — ^a  con- 
comitant of  developed  political  administration. 

Chiefly,  however,  we  have  to  note  that  while  the  higher 
political  evqlution  of  large  social  ^gregates  tends  to  break 
down  the  divisions  of  rank  which  grew  up, in  tjie  small  com^po- 
tient  social  ag^egate^  by  substituting  other  divisions^  these 
original  divisions  are  still  more  broken  down  by  grQwing  indus- 
trialism. Generating  a  wealth  that  is  not  connected  with  rank, 
this  initiates  a  competing  power,  and  at  the  same  time»  by  estab- 
lishing the  equal  positions  of  citizens  before  the  l^w  'w^  respect 
of  trading  transactions,  it  weakens  those-  divisions  which  at  the 
outset  expressed  inequalities  of  position  before  ^he  law. 

As  verifying  these  interpretations  I  may  add  that , they  har-- 
monizewith  the  interpretations  of  cerepionial  institutions  re- 
cently given.  A^  t^e  ppimary  difference?  of  r^nk  result  irom 
vi<:torie$,^nd  fis  the  primary  forms  of  propitiation  priginjite  in 
the  behavior  of  the  vanquished  to  the  vanquishers,  so  the  later 
differences  of  rank  result  from  differences  of  R9wer,  whi<?h,  in 
the  last  resoru  express  ttiemselves  in  physical  coercion,  and  so 
the  pb^ervanc^s  between  ranks  are  recognitions  o{  si|ch*  differ- 
ences of  power.  Ay  hep  the  conquered  enemy  is.road^.  a  .slaver 
and  mutilated  by  taking  a  trophy  from  his  body^  we  pep  simul- 
taneously originating  the  deepesf.  political  distinptijoin  an4  the 
ceremony  which  iparks  it ;  and  with  the  cqntinueid  u^jlitancy 
that  compounds  and  re-compounds  social  group^,  ther^  goes  at 
once  the  development  pf  political  distinctions  and  the  develop- 
ment of  ceremonies  marking  them.  A^^d  as  we  before  saw  that 
growing  industrialism  dinunishes  the  rigpr  of  ceremonial  rule, 
so  here  we  see  that  it  tends  to  destroy  those  class-divisions 
which  militancy  originates,.  an4  to  establi^  others  which  indi- 
cate differpnces  of  position  consequent  pn,  differences  of  apti- 
tude for  Uxe  various  functions  \vhich  an  industrial  society  needs, 

*  '      Herbert  Spencer,  in  The  Fortnightly  Review. 


2^6  THE  LfBkARY  MAGAZINE, 


>IODERN  ITALIAN  POETS. 

One  tii  the  first  specimeiw  I  saw  of  the  "  iiiuova  scuola,**  the 
reah'itit  School  of  Italian  poetry,  hatppened  to  be  Lorenzo  Stec- 
chetti's  **  Postuma/'  It  Cartie'to  me  accompanied  by  a  feeling 
complatfit  o^f  the  usual  sad  fate  and  early  death  o¥  men  of  genius, 
and  the  little  \^Iume  itself  contained  a  shoVt  biography  of  the 
departed  poet;  telling  how  he  wa^  bOrn  m  1845,  iand  was  left  an 
orphan  ^t  fiVe  years  oM,  how  fie  Ifved'  and  studied  and  loved, 
and  fkiaHy-  ffeH  a  victim  to  a  lingering  arid  pafnful  chest  disease 
at  the  eaHy  age  of  thirty-bne.  The  final  scene  is  described  with 
graphic  touches :  To  the  suggestion  of  seeing  a  prrest  he  stoutly 
answered  B0 1' With  his  dying  breath  h^  asked  that  the  window 
should'  be  Open  to  let  him  see  the  sun  once  more,  but  t'hcre  wa^ 
»o  sun.  *^ FiHe** (the  end)  N^-as  his  last  u'Ord!  '  "He  is  buried,*' 
the  account  -comfcludes,  *' Jnthe  <;hurchyard  of  his  viWage  (Fin- 
ftiana),  uhda'  the  fifth  cypress  t6  the  left  as  you  enter.  The 
tombsto^  be^rs  sfmply  th«  names  and  dat^s.  ffe  left  af!  his 
prop^y  t^  charities."  The  account  i^  signed  by  Eh-;  OKnda 
Guei^i,  a  cousin  of  SteCchetti'S';  "*  le  hostre  madri  furono  sor- 
clle**  is  added  for  the  sake  of  accuracy.       '  <     - 

Sorne  ti¥ne' after  receiving  the  Volume,  T  mentioned  Stecchetti 
to  my  fr%n<f  Si^noi^  Mazzifcato,  expressing  my  regref  at  the  un- 
timely eietinctioit  of  hl^  unmistiak'dbre,  a^Fthough  as'  vet  under- 
veloped,'gi^; -whereupkin  Signor  MaiztK:at6  aske^  me  With  a 
smile  to  be  comforted,  for' that  the  author  of  ''Postuma."  so  far 
from  bfeing  dead,  was,  on'  tlie  contrary,  iii  excellent  heakh.  and 
might  be  seeri  ev^ry  evefning  m  Bbfogna  drinking  beer  and  play- 
ing **  tresettie'*  at  the  brasserie  oif  th^c5cce!lent*Otto  Hofmeister, 
to  whom  one  of  his  volumes  is  aflfe(itfOfiately  dedicated.  "  Stec- 
chetti," I  was  further  informed,  is  a^ pseudonym,  the  poet's  real 
name  being  Olindo  Guerini,  the  name  which  stands  at  the  end 
of  his  own  obTtuary  ndtfce. -  •  -   - 

The  reason  for  this  elaborate  hoax  in  the  style  of  Edgar  Poe 


^ems  to  4^vf  t>eeii  that  Steii^chcui,  who  hadliedii  skrigeity  at- 
tacked rby  ^e  critics*  wUhcid  to  see  bow  they  iRKbdki  modify 
their  qpiaioa  ot  him  whea  defunct.  Moreover,  b&  appears  to 
have  thougt^t  tfiat  a  dead,  po«?t  had  a  better  ohaacein  Italy  than 
a  living  Qi^e,  ^nd  in  this  he  waa  evidemly not  mistalcen ;  for 
''  Postuxna"  went  through  six  ^UioAs  in  a  Jhi£l&  OKire  than  a 
year,  and  jt  haiS  certainly  ((contributed  moce  to  ks  author^  repu^ 
tation  tl^aR  anything  be  had  done  before. .  . 

A  t^ick  .of  thi3  kind  •appears  > at  .fixst  ^ight .  acaroely  ttiore  ac- 
countable and  digni^d  tton  the  dedioatida  of  a.serioas  volume 
of  poetry  to  a  t^yen^k^per.  But  all  ,tiii8  and  more  is  folly 
esjp^ain^4  ¥rhen  we  cpnie.  to  .oondidor  the  pecaliar.rpQsltion  of 
SteccheU;i  .^ijid  his  litersMry  companions,  Jheir  yantitfal  eccea- 
triciti^;b^Abe^o  tbeobject  of  ,m0st,«ava©e  attacks  .off  the  part 
of  Vr^spegta})le". critics./.  A^l(the  crimes  ia.t be  Newgate  Calen- 
dar of  lit^ratu^e  and  mP^raUty  iwene  Jaidto  their  charge ;  they 
w^e  compared  tQ  unclean  animals  (vide  ProL  Rizei'6  "Sonetti 
al  X^ajale")*  apd  igenerisUly  handled  ,in  a  stjrlc  CQm|iiired;with 
which  the  t^^tmen^pf  the  ."  Satanic  Sdftool"  by  the  Quarterly 
woul4  apppar  jJhe  pink  of  courte3yii  Their  natorat  retort  was  . 
the  assumption  <^,  ^a  4»xQg|^mted  iCynicism  aqd  Bohetntaniam, 
which,: if  in.spme  m^as^e  i%  seemedi  to  JAUtify:the< attack  of 
their , a^ver^ri^s,  at ithe^ametwlwe.seinfed  to  irritate  them. 
Tliis,  ^.Jea^,  is  the  attitude  aasvM»ed  byStecobetti  inihe  elab- 
orate fsss^y  iQ  defense  of  the  aew  school  which  he  has  pcvfined 
tojiis*;  Nova  Pplemica*"  and  which,  in  a. convenient  for n»,aums 
up  .tjie  charges  piftde  gainst  cbe  movement*  iuid,,by:infenBnce, 
its  owi^  aifp  an^  raison  ^'etre*        r: 

.  Steqchctti  begins  by  crowing  over  hfa  critics 'for.  havirig  gone 
into  the  trap §et  them  by  the rumorof  his  deatii.  **  When  they 
thought  me  defunct,"  he  ^iplaims.  "they  were  willing  to  bury 
me  in  the  Capitol  with  every  honor ;  now  that  they  see  me 'come 
forth  from  the  hearse,, they  will  no  doubt:  con tinue  to  throw  rtic 
from  the  T^peia^  rock."  To  iivJuce  >sudi  a  vtolent  bourse  his 
••5j|)pij?gia"  i§  iff§leed  iveJJ  j^dapted.    "Plrima  di  tiittoi  dici,iche 


238  THE^  LiBRAR  Y  MA  iSA^firM,-  ^ 

non  dcodoriB  Dm"  he  address^  the  " nlaleVoTertt  ftftSef* M^ihi^ 
outset,  and  b^msi to  discuss  reU^otrs  questidris  iW  ^  W^lhriier 
which  shpws  that  the foi-6idden  charm  6i  wickedness  an^©yfohi-' 
ism  still  Bttadtes:t6  flippant  unbelief  in  Italy.  Ih-England  the 
days  are  fortunately  over  when  Shelley  thotigltt  it  nete^iiry  td 
proclaim  JiiSi  atheism  jn  the  vl«hor»s'  album  at  the  Chartreuse 
at  Montanvert*  bwt young. Ftatiaii^ evidently  ^111  feveto  pbse in 
the  interesting  attitude- of  militant  unbelievers,  a  cfrttimistance 
scarcely  Jess  oreiKtable  tc^  theiif  owti  tafet  than  to  the  wrsdoin  of 
the  oitthodosccritidS' whom  ihey  hbipfe't^irHtateu  ' 

Stecehetti  metxti  turiis  to  ih^  charge  ol  imhi^raiity  raised 
against  tbejuew  8chpol,>€lnd  again  reveals^a  mind  rather  tynftal  "^ 
than  thooghtlui    His  gloriftoation  of  th^  lenses  remfinds  one  of 
the  early  writiags  of  Heinft,- wherein  he  used  to  preach  the  dod-  - 
trine  of  the  **  third  testament^  o^  Joy*  wliich  would  be  so  true 
andso'pleaBtntif  youtWand  health  and  money  would  only  laist 
forever'     Stecchetti '  elsewtoerfe  proelaimfe  Byron,  Hfeine,  and 
Alfred  :de  iMnsset  tb  be  his  pbetic  tflnity.-artd  he  has  evidently"* 
studied  hi$  Jiiotlrfs  tosofise  purpose.    Mis  pl^a  in  excuse  of  the 
cynical  temHencyof  his  poetry 'iasingtilaf'eriou'gh.*   He  sifnply; 
declares  that  the  public  are  tired  6f  i46sft  W6ttie^.  that  tftejrtrarit 
realities,  and  thfit  th^se  deaUdes  Are  a^nyt^iiig' but  what  nibral 
and  religions ; people  might  defei re.    Thife  method  is  at  test  as  * 
good  as^hat  of  paintiflgiL  id  use  Schiller's  word^,**  vke  a^  the 
devil. b^T'^he  side  of  it,"' so  as  to  please  both  the  Wicked  tmd  the  * 
virtuous  -iSignor  Stecchetti  d^^s  not  pretend  io  kny'^eat  de-  ' 
gree  of  »viftu^,. neither  does  -be  attend pt -to  cov^  hts  Hcdntious 
pictures  with  the  mantle  of  an  ulterior  m6*M  and  dldiictic  jjur- 
pose;. all  he  slays  is  that  whkt  he de^tnbfe*  is  true,  a^d  therefore 
a  legitimate'  objett  rtf  modern  matistic  as  opposed  to  conven-  • 
tional  "ideal"  poetry.    This  ptea,  aUhoiigh  it  does  not  justify  ' 
the  tone  of  some  of  Stecchetti's  ^x>erts,  explkins  well  the  raisori 
d'etre  of.  the  new  school.     It  does  not  materially  ciiffer  from  the 
I'art  ^ur  I'lfft-^inciple,  of  whfkh  feo  much  has  been* heard  of  • 
1^  botli.  ia  Fmace  and  ^England;  ^neith^t-  do  the  v^ristl^|h6«f. 


MODBkN  ITALIAN  POETS,  239 

mach  origiftality  ih  ^scirlbing  thdr  pro^mme  as  a  *  fetum  to 
nature."  That  pliable  tertn  has  beeh  the  battle-cry  <Jf  every 
new  movement  in  literature,  and  its  significance  fe  to  a  great 
extent  detfermtned  by  the  double  question  whence  that  return 
Is  made  and  whether  it  leads.  In  Italy,  however,  Some  such 
movement  was'needed  beyond  a  tioabt.  '  Htr  last  great  poet,  Leo- 
pardi,  died  half  a  century  ago,  and  he  left  ho  school.  Only  what 
was  kast'  Individual  in  him,  his  sorr<iw  for  the  fate  of  his  coun- 
try, found  ait  echo  in  the  patriotic  songs  which  record  thfe  long 
strife  for  Italian  unity.  But  even  thii  motive  has  lost  its  mean- 
ing now  that  the  goal  is  reached.  This  is  well  pointed  out  by 
Stecchettl.  who,  as  soon' as  he  forgets  his  cynicism  and  his  griev- 
afices  ag^insit  the  critics,' becomes  sensiWe  and  eVeti 'eloquent. 
"In  1^60,''  he  says,  "thett  was  the  ideal  of  a  tmited  Italy.  At 
pl^serit,  whert  th^  unity  fs  no  longer ' discussed  or  threatened, 
how  can  we  have  and  sing  the  same  ideal?  Should  we,  ptr- 
haps,  hold  m^eet4ngs  for  ITtalia  irridehta?  Whkt  woiild  'II 
Ptfrtgolo'-and  ^*  La  P^severariza'  siy  theri  >  Realism,  in  short, 
i^ 'nothing  but  t%e  ^etit'of  ^  social  bnditT6\i— a  moment  1n  a 
social  evolution.  .  /  .  We  sdannot  have  an  ideal,  b^dause  we  can- 
not find  -bn^  in  thi?  ^iresent  state  brf  thiiigi  and  the  old  ones 
w^Hild  be  no  longef  ill  their  ^ace  fn  Ofirt"  State,  our  s6ciety,  our 
family.  Give  u^  a  neW  idea,  at  oncfe  de^^atfed  and  irt'  accordance 
with  the  demands  of  the  epoth,  and  the  singer  of  that  idea  will 
be  fbi*th<*omfng  Without  delay  ^  neither  will'  ther^  be'  wanting 
the  eorifess6i*S:  and  mattyrs,  such  ^s  there  Were  for  dther  Meals." 
-And' here  we  touch  iipon  the  really  important  side  6f  the  new 
movdmrent.  The  altei^  state  of  the  political  condition'  in  Italy 
ha^  btVMight  about  a  commehslirate  change  of  public  feeling.  A 
long  period  of  political  and'  social  lethat^  is  naturally  followed 
by  a  powerful  impulse  at  iirst  in  the  practical  direction ;  and, 
however  archaeologists  and  artists  and  poets  may  deplore  the 
external  changes  involved  in  such  a  movement,  it  is  impossible 
td  deny  its-'-neccfssityfin  the  natliral  order  of  things.  Students 
oHite^rtlireh&^^  at^t?he'same  timt  been  curious  to  see  ti^h^the^ 


2^^  THE  UBitAR  Y  MAOAZINEi 

th^  te^yival  of  Italia^i  un.ity  wpuJd  infuse  new  life  into  Italiai^ 
poetry,  whether  the  yaited  nation  would  produce  a=  great  na- 
tional poet.  To  answer  that  question  in  the  affirmative  would  be* 
to  say  the  least,  premature.  The  "  nuova  scuola"  has  not  at 
present  produced  a  man  worthy  of  being  named  bj  the  side  of 
Leopardi,  but  it  has  as  undoabie,dly  paved  his  way  if  he  should 
kppear.  This  merit  is  beyond  dispute ;  it  may  be  proved  by 
figures  and  statistics.  "^  few  years  ago,"  Steochetti  says^ 
"only  French  books  i^e^e  r^ad  ia  Italy,  and  our.  country  was 
the  drain  into  which;  third  and  fourth  rate  Ffec^ch  novelist^ 
emptied  their  inanities.  Pope  Gregory— ^g(;>od  old-  so^l— wia^  an 
enthusiastic  admirer  of  Pau^  de  Kock's.  novels.  Italian  books^ 
had  no  sale.  How  is  it>  then,  that  our.  little  emancipation  from 
the  gre^t  Parisian  niarket,  our  little  revival  of  literature,,  has  • 
come  to  pass  exactly  when  our  poets  bave  g^ven  up  swimming  • 
agaii^st  tbe  stream  of  the  time  with  their  tr^;efiies»  idyls,r  historic 
romance?,  and  sacred  hymns?"  The  final  sentence  alludes  to 
Manzopi  and  his  school,  against  which  the  veristiw^ge  inces", 
santwar,  without,  however,  in  their  c^lm  momeats  faiUngto 
acknowledge  the  genius  of  the  autbor  of  "  I  prpmefisi  Sposi." 
But,  although  an  ex  part^  statement,  Steqcheui's  remarks  are 
true  in  most  respects.  M^nzoni's  poetry  is  sublio^e,  dignified  in  , 
expression,  and  strictly  religious;  modern  Italians  are  practical,, 
matter-of-fact  in  speech,  and,  among  the  intelligent  classeq,, 
thoroughly  skeptical,  at  least  anti-Catholic.  The  ooasequencQ  ; 
has  been  for  a  number  of  years  a  total  wan^  of  rapport  between 
the  public  and  the  Manzoniani,  and  a  general  decline  of  inter^t 
in  any  poetry.  what9ver.  Stecchetti's  statement  in  this  respect 
is  fully  confirmed  by  independent  testimony.  Signor  Enrico 
Panzacchi.  for  example,  by  no  means  a  blind  admirer  of  the  new 
school,  states  how  in  former  days  *'e:^&a  the  aw)st  celebrated 
poets,  Prati  and  Aleardi,  had  to  bow  to  the  indifference  of  the 
public  spirit,  and  to  wait  for  some  event  in  order  to  justify  in 
some  meiasure  the  publication  of  a  ii^wpoem."  vA^l  this  is 
aUeo6d»;andth£'^fdtQr  yoluLmqg;  in  wj^^:,^ty:|tegyy.BPfl^|j|^.TQ» 


.lippear  before  tiie.worid,  zjbA  to  whiich  they  owe  their  «econd 
nickname  of  '•  Elzeviriani,"  are  fouod  on  every  bookstall.  To 
^ve  revived  .the  Interest  ^of  Italians  in  their  native  poetry  is, 
absc^^^tely  speaking,  a  feat  well  worthy  of  notice  apart  from  the 
intfiiwcinerit  of  ti»at poetry; 

The  faqt  i&  the  moce  Curious  as  the  nuova  octtola  derives  its 
poetjf?  cachet  dijjtinctiy  from  French  sourcea.  those  Who  re- 
saeoiher  the  movement  of  the  *"  Panuttsietis"  in  France,  or  have 
.^e^e^  U^ir  ei^centric  organ  La  R^ubiique  des  Lettres,  will  at 
^^nc$,irecog«i«e:a  kind  of  elective  adinicy  with  the- Italian  poets. 
Ther^  is  npt,  as  in  the  case  of  some  English  writers,  adiredt  im- 
itation^ ILtalian  poetry  is  too  .rich  in  heautilyil  and  varied  foi^ms 
tp  have  to  borrow  rondeaiix  atidiXMidets  and  tridtets  fixim  VlMon 
thfp^h  the  mediuQi  mf  M.  Theodore  de  Banvtile.  •  An  innate 
leeli^  for  beaaty  ateo  has  protected  even  Stecchetti  and  -other 
e^tre^ne  membeit  of.  the  j9dKx>llroni  the  delight  ih^lhh  and 
abominai^ioQ  wht^constiuitssthe  higher  moml$tyof  Zola.  But 
theex^rAftlleattfres^thebattle-^cry  of  realism  at  any  pnKoe,  the 
i:evival;p(  ^Id  v^rseioniiSr  the  violent  radicalism  in  rel%idn  and 
m  politics^  the  indifforenoe  as  to  ocher  people's  pi^ejodkies— all 
this  w^-tinf}  i<  Milan  awl  Bokgna  asweH  as  in  Pads.  For  ft 
should  h^  noted  that  the  new  nioveroent  belongs  exttoslvely  to 
the  no4:ti>  o(,  Jt«aly.  it  '\%\ti  the  two  cities  alHsady  i^med  that 
most  of  thp  Vf^isti  rieside^  and  here  theiir  works  are  jpbbM^hed, 
^nd  ^^odqubt  chi^y  mad^  By  birth  aiso  the  leaders  oi  -the  school 
belong  to  th/e  fltfwrth. . 

T9  return  to  the  paralteiism  with  the  modern  French  school, 
it  extends  .to  the  taate  for  certain  congenial  itiot'etrtents  in  the 
sister  arts  of  painting  and  music.  When  Wagner •s"'^*anrthaoser" 
was  hissed  of!  tl}«.9ta^  in  Paris  itiwas  Grautier  and  Baudelaire 
and  CatuUe  Mendez  who  bc^me  his  champions ;  ;and  the  appear- 
ance of  "  Lohengrin"  at  Bologna  was  received  with  poetic  accla- 
mations of  the  highest  enthusiasm  by  the  young  bards  of  the 
ancient  university  city.     I  may  mention  in  this  ,cp.pnectio?i/'that 

*r^d^i  pi-oihisirig  "comjiospr  ftf^  jaod^aJiaJji-^^^ 


242  THE  UBKA^RT  ^AGAZmS, 

Boito,  the  autlK)r  of  **Miephistopheie»'!.is  at  the  same  time  a.di^ 
tinguished  poet  of  the  nav  schooL 

It  is  tin%e  that  we  should  kave  generalities  for  individual  cases, 
and  inquire  into  the  merits  of. some  of  the  leaders  of  the  new 
movement.  To  begin  with  Stecchetti  himself,  he  may  be  char- 
acterized iiv  comparatively  ffew  words.  Therels  nothing  complex 
or  occult  in  his  .poetical  iConstitution,  arid  the  themes  hie  hds 
chosen  are  of  the  simplest,  One  may  say  most  primitive  kind. 
Love,,  of  course,  stands  at  the  head'of  them ;  and  as  to  the  nature 
of  that  love  the  r^der  will  be  able  to  form  an  idea  by  what  has 
been  said  before.  To  condemn  obvious  jtfveniHa  of  this  kind 
with  the  stem  mind  of  thfe  moralist  would  be.  obvJoilisly  out  of 
place.  But  even  from  the  acsthctical  point  of  view,  which  Stec- 
chetti justly  asks  hiai  criticafto  occupy*,  then©  is  a  great  deal  that 
is  highly  o^>jeci:ionable  in  the  tone- pf  his  aihofous  raptures,  in 
his  frequent  referenced  to  **  la  carhe,"  and  similar  exCrcscetices 
of  a  youthful  imagination..  Thatanytbin^  a^>pfbaching  to  a  di*- 
rectapp^l  to  |he  senses,  whether  m  the  way?  of^  |>leasore  or  of 
horror,^  ceases  ta  be  aHU  ks.an  axiom  acknowledged  >  hf  the  best 
opinions  <p|  all  ages.;  Siteqchetti  here  has  out^Musseted  Musset 
and  out-Heitied  the  youthful ;  {ieirie  m  o:  mianner  which  does 
more  credit  to  his  powers  of  assimitation- than  ^to  His  discretion. 
Of  Heine '^  "  WeltfedMniera  ">  also  we  have  aknple  supply  in  such 
poems  of  "Noia,"  in  which  the  po^  regT«3the  happiness  of  lits 
"  Cari  vent*  anni.!'  and  k>Qk8  upon  the  wortd  in  general  thtoijgh 
the  black  spectacles  of  his  ennui.  Again,  we  find  him  in  other 
poems  of  the  V  Po^uma":  develop  thiac  vtaleni;  de  chambfe^  de 
malade/'  which  supplies  a  kind  «if  poetic  commentary  ta  the  story 
of  his  own  <)eath  in  the  preface. 

Quaato  2ak6r^^^amtk  gidta  in  Quegto  mendo 

Di  pocbi  passi  che  si  dc^,a]  sol^ ! 

Oh  quanta  viu !    Ed  io  son  moribondo  ♦ 

he  exctalms  at  the  end  of  one  of  his  most  melodian  sonnets,  and 

*  '"''  What  lovii,  what  ]oy  in  this  world  of  a  few  paces  (his  garden)  wbicb  widccQa 
to  tlMt^4ML^«iui^;^^aodf^am  doomed  to  d!^**'-      w  ^^^'' 


JUVDMJ^AT  ITAZIAK  POETS,  243 

the  same  sad  note  is  faintly  Audible  in  many  of  his  poems.  In 
the  outbursts  of  jealousy  and  other  troubles  caused  the  poet  by 
the  fickleness  of  his  various  mi$tre$ses.  the  influence  of  Heine's 
early  work  gains  prominence.  Stecchetti  is  alternately  cynical 
and  sad ;  and  by  saying  that  he  is  influenced  by  Heine  I  do  not 
wish  to  deny  that  there  is  much  that  is  fine  and  powerful  in  such 
lines  aJs  those  which  I  subjoin  in  a  literal  translation  : 

And  since  that  night  I  never  more  saw  thee. 
And  never  knew  thy  fate  or  heard  thy  name. 
At  tW«  ho»r.  it  nay  bie. 
ThoM  aunde^^at  ^e  gate  in  tin  and  ihame^ 
Expecunt  who  woMld  buy 
Thy  venal  kisses.    Maybe  thou  didst  die. 
Pferhaps— the  thou^t  ftf  bitterer'  to  my  heart— 
)    '   -    Ti»trliaBtfdrgoittenUiyd8i>antdIllt, 
.  y        .     .  ,^itoawcolntetHecri^t 

In  the  chaste  duty  jof  a  happy  wife ; 

Tending  wfth  love  divine 

The  chUdrsn  of  a  lo^eifi^ifth  is  iidt  mlM. 

Bat  iir  spite  of  admirable  detached  passages,  it  must  be  owned 
that  Stecchetti's  love  poetry,  with  it^  raptures  and  regrets,  has 
about  it  a  touch  of  the  mechanical,  which  extends  even  to  his 
description  of  external  appearance.  Hfe  has  the  love  of  all  south- 
em  poets  forfan"-hah^  beauties,  and  in  Milan  no  doubt  the 
type  is  by  no  means  fincomthon.  At  the  same  time  it  is  scarcely 
credible  that  the  stereotyped  phrases  of  "testa  biondaV'"capelli 
biohdi  **  should  appTy  to  all  the  numerous  ladies  whose  charms 
the  poet  celebrates. 

For  this  and  other  reasons  onefindis  the  poet  most  satisfactory 
where  he  forgets  his  Byr6nic  attitudes,  and  gives  utterance  to 
simple,  unsophisticated  feeling.  The  subjoined  lyric,  in  k  nieter 
which  St^cchetti's  reserve  for  poems  of  this  kind,  may  not  con- 
tain nmch  depth  of  thought  or  originality  of  diction,  but  it  has 
the  true  ring  of  lyrical  poetry  : 

'  Un  organettd  siiona  per  la  via 
La  mia  finea&A  6  apena  e  vien  la  aefi, 
^i«w^.<:.««       'vSal#dalcMttpija]kis(a^zacciaAit 


344  THE  UBRAI^T  MAGAZiME. 

Nonao  percMmi  trnniao  i-gfioQCchi 

Non  so  perch^  mi  saiga  il  pianto  agli  occhi. 
Ecco,  io  chino  la  testa  in  suUa  mano 
E  penso  a  te  che  sci  cosi  lontano.* 

Almost  equally  sweet  is  the  sentiment  of  the  stanzas  b^ginping 
"Quando  tu  sarai  vecchia,"  which  he  has  borrowed  from  Beran- 
ger,  Beranger  from  Ronsard,  and  Ronsard  from  TibuUus.  Only 
in  the  last  line  there  is  a  harsh  dissonance  peculiar  to  the  Italian 
poet. 

But  Stecchetti  is  not  always  in  thse  m^ftijig  mood.  He  has  a 
quiet  humor  of  his  own,  and  his  attacks  oa  his  detractors  are 
sometimes  very  quaint  and  pretty,  as.  for  instance,  where  in  a 
poem  of  anything  but  vuximpeachabje.  Latin  and  morality  he 
comforts  his  muse  by  the  sweeping  assertioD,'^' Nesciunt  critici 
latinum,  quamvis  macaronicum."  He  has  aba  admirably  caught 
Heine's  trick  of  throwing,  as  it  were,  cold  water  on  the  enthusi- 
asm called  forth  by  the  passionate  begiisiningjDf  a  love  poem. 
Thus  he  describes  with  great  intensity  how«  in  ^rbeautjfuJ  ^''^m. 
he  floats  in  a  frail  bark  op  the  se^  alone  with  hi^  loved  o#^ 
rocked  by  the  waves  and  seen  only  by  the  stai;?:  '  'Suddenly  ^e 
is  silent,  and,  struck  by  a  thought,  she  lifts  her  blaa.de  head  froqi 
.my  4»houlder8,  and  with  her  fac^  stra^qg^ly  fi;[^ed  ,Qn  the  cjeep 
darkness  of  the  ni^ht  she  whispers*/  Be  ^^ilj^t,  yondef  9^e,  tb£ 
lights  of  Lissa.' " 

Take  him  all  in  all  Stecchetti  i$  a  literary  phenomenon  of  no 
small  interest.  He  is  evidently  young,  and  his  work  ^.lw?ws  the 
sins  and  sillinesses  pf  youth,  but  there  is  unmi^aHable  pow^  ol 
a  more  or  less  undeveloped  mind.  Among  the  veri^ti  l?e  repre- 
sents the  Bohemian  side  of  the  movement;  and  his  faulty  ma^ 
be  to  a  great  extent  explained  from  the  false  and  exaggerated 
position  in  which  he  was  placed  by  the  injudicious  attack^  o4  his 
critics. 

*  '"■  An  organ  sounds  In  the  street;  my  window  in  open,  and  evening  b  coming.  { 

From  the  fields  comes  to  my  chamber  jigeoUe  breath  o(  <9priiig.  I  do  not  know 
why  my  knees  tremble ;  I  do  not  kn.  w  why-D^ai^^riae;  to  agr  f  ycs>  Behold,  I  kaa 
myfaead  OB  my  hand,  aad  think  ol  lhiM4llllk^4V04»  IMT.**      . '^ 


MOD&RN  ITALIAN  POETS.  24$ 

Anothenr  exponent  ^  the  same  extreme  principles,  to  whom  we 
must  now  turn,  is  Emilio  Praga,  one  of  the  most  interesting 
poets  of  the  new  school.  He  is  a  kind  of  tragic  pendant  to 
Stecchetti.  What  the  latter  frequently  pretends  to  be  the 
former  is  in  sad  earnest.  There  is  in  the  first  instance,  unfor- 
tunately, no  doubt  as  to  Praga  being  dead.  His  premature  end 
made  a  painful  sensation  in  Italy,  and  Domenico  Milelli,  another 
verista,  has  laid  his  volume  of  -  Odi  Pagane "  on  the  "  grave 
marked  No.  10  in  the  cemetery  of  Porta  Magenta  (Milan)," 
where  Praga  is  buried.  His  life  is  soon  told  ;  it  is  typical  of  a 
phase  too  common  in  the  rapid  transitions  of  modem  existence : 
a  man  of  high  imaginative  power,  in  ^arch  of  new  ideals,  dis- 
satisfied with  established  law  and  custom,  and  at  the  same  time' 
unable  to  keep  his  moral  equilibrium  without  them.  Bom  in 
1339,  Emilio  Praga  started  in  life  as  a  landscape  painter,  it  is 
said,  of  no  ordinary  power,  and  with  the  same  tendency  towards 
the  somber  and  melancholy  which  is  observable  in  his  poetry. 
But  he  soon  seems  to  have  discovered  his  vocation  for  litera- 
ture, and  published  his  first  collection  of  verse  at  the  age  of 
twenty-three,  under  the  title  "La  Tavolazxa"  (The  Palette). 
It  wAs  brought  out  against  the  advice  of  pmdent  friends,  and 
With  little  hope  of  success.  All  the  poet  asks  for  is  a  stray 
flower  or  sprig  of  Isiurel;  and  he  compares  himself  to  a  Savoyard 
boy  going  about  the  cafes  pkying  his  fiddle,  and  too  grateful  if 
any  one  has  a  ki«ri  word  tor  him.  Of  kind  words,  or,  indeed, 
of  any  words,  he  was  not  to  have  many.  In  those  days  the 
public  interest  was  entirely  taken  up  by  the  great  political 
changes  which  had  gone  before  and  were  impending,  and 
Praga's  volume  fdl  dead  from  the  press.  But,  nothing  daunted, 
the  poet  continued  to  work,  and  two  years  after  his  first  book 
he  published  a-second  of 'increased  import  and  maturity.  On 
this  second  effort,  called  "Penombre"  (1864),  Praga's  claim  to 
immortality  must  mainly  rest.  He  still  published  another  vol- 
ume of  verse,  consisting  of  "  Stories  and  Xflgends";  but  narra- 
tive poetry  was  evidently  not- cong^Bkiai^to  his  intensely  Individ- 


246  THU  L/mU/^  r  MACAZIMM. 

u^l  mind. .  Neither  dp;  hi$  di?ariatic  efforts  seem  1  to  4iave  been 
condemned  without  good  reason,  if  one  may  j^dge  by  the  speci- 
men printed  in  a  posthumoiLis. volume.  It  is  called  **  Fantasma," 
and  ij?„  indeed,  of  a  very  shadowy  character*  Its  motive  is  that 
constant  wavering  between  sin  and.  repentance,  which  is  the 
key-note  also  of  Praga's  lyrical  poetry;  and  the  author  has  suc- 
ceeded in  cramming  intQ  a  few  scenes  aauimberof  painfjil  inci-  , 
dents  and  some  very  beautiful  lines  of  rhetorical  poetry.  The 
**Fantasma''  was  pjayedat  Milan  in  1870,  and  seenJs  to  have  met 
with  a  moderate  success  Two  pieces,  ^'Le.madri  galanti'*  (writ- 
ten in  collaboration  with  Arrigo  Boita)  and  "  II  capolavpro 
d'Orlando,-' preceding  it,  had.  been  hissed  off  the  stage ;  a  roman- 
tic drapa,  "Altri  Tempi,"  written  subsequently,  was  rehearsed  at 
various  theaters,  but  never  performed.  Praga's  solitary  dra- 
ipatic  success  was  his  faithful  and  elegant  translation  of 
Coppee's  "Le  Passant.";  The  detached  lyrics  of  his  latter 
years  Praga  intended  to  collect  in  a  volume  of  "Trasparenze;" 
bi;t  death  overtook  him  in  1874,  and  the  work  -ixras  published 
posthumously.  There  is,  unfortunately,  little  doubt  that  that 
death  Wi^s  ;^cqelerat^d  by  his  own  excesses,  although  Signor 
Molineri,  his  biQgrapher,  detiies  the  assertions  of-  charitable 
critics  that  Praga  died  of  delirium  tremens,  and  that  his  later 
poems  were  written  tender  the  influfintecjof  absinthe.  Of  his  pri- 
vate life  it  is  ascertainable  only  that  h?  was  intensely  fond  of  his 
littje  spn,  a  fact,  moreover,  which  is  beatitifuUy  apparent  from 
his  poetry.  From  that  son  and  from  his  wife  he  was  separated 
shortly  before  his  death ;  fip^r  what  reason  we  are  nbt  toM. 

It  would  have  been  unnecessary  to  dwell  on  these  common 
and  melancholy  Incidents  but  for  the  curious  reflex  they  find  in 
Praga's  poetr}^  Never  has  the  interconnection  between  a  man's 
life  and  a  man's  work  been  illustrated  in  a  more  striking  man- 
ner. In  the  opening  "  preludio "  of  "Penombre"  the  poet 
exclaims — 

Oiaochft  canto  ana  mtscracansoiM 
.    M^^liatgtil  vero, 


UOI)E/tN  TTALIA^r  POETS,  247 

ahd  to  tbis  programtne  he  has  adlici^d  thvoughoot  his  poetical 
career.  He  is  in  the  first  instancie  true,  a  verista  in  a  sense 
more  literal  and  more  tragic  than  the  more  aesthetic  realists  of 
the  school  ever  dreamed  of.  Hence  the  strong  tone  of  individ- 
ual suffelring  which  gives  to  Praga's  work  an  almost  painful 
interest.  For  hfs  is  not  a  healthy  attitude  of  life  and  raind. 
Like  Alfred  de  Musset'fe  "  Rolla,"  "  il  est  vcnu  trop  tard  dans  un 
mbnde  trop  vieux  ;*'  and  in  that  world  of  doubt  and  temptation 
and  practical  strife  he  is  as  one  in  a  wilderness.  Unlike  Stec- 
chetti,  Prag^is  hot  a  bold  unbeliever  or  an  open  sensualist.  He 
loves  the  good  but  does  thfc  evil  j  and  at  the  gay  banquet, 
amidst  the  clinking  of  glasses  and  the  laughter  of  girls^  he  hears 
the  distant  bells,  which  rennfind  him  of  childhood  and  pure  love. 
•'Poor  child!"  he  sa>*s  in  another  poem,  "-^hat  can  you  say  of 
me  ?  i  am  m>t  a  fool  nor  a  coward !  I  have  loved  you  in  good 
days  and  evil,  and  love  thee  still  with  a  pure  holy  love.  But 
there  are  days  When '  my  heart  grows  famt,  when  the  mud 
threatens  to  choke  me ;  pray,  pray  for  a  pure  sky.-  For  do  you 
riot  know  that  man  ts  also  a  brute  ?    Fly,  fly  from  me." 

That  this  frame  oltnind  leads  in  its  ultimate  conseqnences  to 
a  m6rbtd  delight  in  the  horrible  will  not  surprise  psychologists. 
This  side  of  Praga's  poetry  finds  its  climax  in  the  Hnes  ad- 
dressed "A  un  feto,"  and  is  expressed  in  a  less  crude,  though 
hardly  less  powerful,  form  in  a  poem  on  the  death  of  Seraphina, 
the  twin-sister  of  Heine's  **K5nigin  Pomare."  Fortunately  there 
is  a  bright  cburftbrpart  to  this  dark  iide  of  thfe  pictutiei.  The 
happy  chiidhoiad  of  pKiga  has  left  its  echo  in  such  charming 
creations  as  the  poem  called  ''Noli,'-  after  the  fishing  village  of 
i^t  name ;  and  another,  dedicated  to  the  memory  of  the  good 
village  priest  to  whom  he  owed  his  early  education.  The  poet 
here  is  genuinely  at  home,  quite  as  much,  at  beast,  as  in  the 
vicious  atmosphere  of  a  great  city,  and  his  r^fret  of  the  past  is 
entirely  free  from  the  affectation  too  common  in  such  moral 
effusions.  He  is,  mor^eoEver,  a  reaMover^  nature,  which  is  not 
$aytitg  a  iittte  9!  an  Italian  poet;  for  tbt  resp^dttAt^icetiuiqr  ^ 


24?  Tim  LIBHAR  Y  MAGAZINE-. 

the  South  has  curiously  ertoiigfe  lelt  $%ht  tmees  in  the  poetsy- 
of  southern  nations.  The  troubadours  of  Ppovencc  refer  to 
blue  skies  and  spring  blossoms  in- the  most  conventional  man- 
ner, and  the  great  Italian  poets  of  the  middle  ages  were  not  at 
least  par  excellenoe  lovers  of  nature,  any  nH>re  than  Raphael 
and  Leonardo  were  landscape  painters^  Piaga's  early  artistic 
training  may  tq  soone  extent  account  k»r  his  gei^ainie  love  of  the- 
country.  At  the  same  time  he  is  not  a  minute  observer  of  every . 
little  flower  add  every  chaise  of  eloudsJn  the  sense,  for  instance,, 
that  Wordsworth'  i&;.  neither  does  he  ever  attempt  an  actual 
pictorial  ejffect.  It  would  be  ea^  to  guess^  if  one  did  not  know,, 
that  the  hand  which  penned'  the.  descriptions  of  scenery  in  the. 
"  Princess  of  Thule"  mustatonetidie  have  held  the' brush;  but 
there  is  nothing  in  Praga  to  belray  the  old  landscape  painter 
beyond  the  intense  sympathy  with  nature  already- all uc)ed  to. 
The  beautiful'  poems  addressed  by  Praga  to  hia^  child;  should 
finally  be  mentioned.  The  sentiment  in  these-  is^as  true  as  it  is 
pure.  They  are  not,  as  some  readers  might  in  fen  specimens  of 
Italian  baby-worship,  The  poet  looks  upon  his  l>oy  with  the. 
eyes  of  a  thoughtful  and  even  a  sad  man ;  b^  at  the  same  time 
he  sees  in  a  child's  smile  at  once  the  hope  and  the  mystery  qI 
man's  destiny. 

Un  vagito  di  bimbo,  ecco  la  fedc, 
Bcco  il  segi'eto  dei  d«8tidi  vmani. 

1 

It  wotrid  be  idle  to  prophesy  that  Praga,  had  he  livedo  would) 
have  been  a  gneat  poet.  Of  the  attributes  bdortging  to  such  im: 
had  at  least  two— mtensity  and  trtith  of  feeling;  but  two  othera 
seem  as  conspicuously  wanting  in  the  work  he  has^  left  beWndr 
him.  These  are  balance  of  mind  and  beauty  of  form.  With  re^' 
gard  to  the  latter  it  may  seem  presumptuous  for  a  foreigner  to: 
speak  m  an  authoritative  manner.  But  judged  by  the  staadardi 
of  Dante  and  Petrarch  and  Leopardi,  and  even  of  Carducci  and 
Stecehcttt,  Praga  seeois  to  cnei.to.lack  tk^  perfect  g^mmetKy  ot 
^ophte;4<wifepimi<r«  and  ^l^at  tatrmonip^s  jrhytbm:,ql  ^wt^ 


^ffteiioot  wtdch  ati  ftaliati  poet,  albek  x>f  Hie  Re«t?!stic  Schoc^, 
can  scarcel3r  be  'inraglned. 

Stecchetti  and  Pwiga.  vfkth  inany  others,  fe{>res**it,  a^  it  wete, 
^he  extreme  left  of  the  vwlw!.  Th^ey  ane  Bohemia  As  by  prbfes- 
sicii,  :and  in«6oiicl*slble  enemies  to  lltemiy  proprieties.  Their 
'worics  «pe  pvfbKshed  by  a  eeita^n  fiitD,  4and'  their  readers^,  in  afl 
pn^sabilliy,  4ifltited  t^  a  eertain— although,  no  doubt,  a  wide — 
circle  of  reaiders.  All  t*»i^  is  (twanged  as  soon  as  we  come  to 
«peak:  of  fittest'  ae^nowkdg«d  leader  <rf  the  school,  Oiosw^  Car- 
dticd.  ife^te  ttdrtiitted  by  wrieers  o^  all  parties  to  be  t^ 
leaxlliig  poet  of  Itriy;  the  roost  estaked  bi*d  rtost  b^uti*- 
fu* lady  <rflJi»c<ktfitTy  has' paid  trfbtfte  tty his  ^ius;  and  hts 
liteMry  re^i^^fiabiliiy  Is  coiffir^^d  'by  «  hand^^>wie  Mit^on  of  his 
collected  poems  under  the  a&sptees  of  tte  c61ebrat^d  firm  of 
Barbara  in  Florence.  In  short,  tie  is  oh  the  straight  road  to 
classical  dignity;  And  alf- thlshe  has  achieved  without  forfeit- 
ing theaddf^atAott  of  hfe  own  imtnediate  followers.  Donienico 
MftetK,  a  thorcwgh-paced  Bc^emiari,  dedi<dateS  to  hhn  a  pc>et- 
ical  confession  Of  iaiHh,  and  Steechetti  calls  him  '*  nostro  duce 
ihtanto  <e  nostra  ibrea."  It  may  be  snrtnbed  that  a  poet  who  is 
thus  able  to' please  Oppositfe  parties  tnuSIt  possess  high  qualities 
independent  of  all  party  considerations. 

•  Giosu^  Carducci's  Hfe  is  devoid  of  stirring  incidents ;  with 
few  interruptions  ?t  has  been  •  that  of  the  poet  and  the  scholar. 
He  was  born  in  1836,  at  Val  di  Castello,  near  Pietrasanta,  in  the 
prtwrince  of  Pisa,  the  son  of  a  physician  of  moderate  means. 
His  elrly  youth  was  passed  In  a  small  village  of  the  Maremma, 
where  his  father  had  an  appointment  as  inedlcal  man  to  a  Fren<^h 
mining  company,  The  dreary  solitude  of  this  fc vet-haunted 
region  did  not  depress  the  spirit  of  the  boy,  who  itere  received 
his  fearllest  poetic  impression*,  and  who,  moreover,  was  at  liberty 
to  follow  his  studious  inclinations  under  his  father's  gaidance. 
The  latter  was  by  literary  creed  a  member  of  that  school  of 
Man;R>ni  wOrt(hipers  which  his  son  was  destined  to  destroy,  bt 
itPliiM'^tlymw^to'the  backgmcrhd^otase^^  ^Wnt^bit 


250  THB  %IBRART  MAGA^N^, 

hitolUgent  raetr.of  His  day  Dr.  M^chele  GardtiCQt^A;^^^  a  €atb6- 
naro,  and  his  liberal  views  were  developed  by!  his  son  iirte  ihc 
extreme  lorms  of  radicaHsm.  ,  As- early  a»^l849!  trhe  youthful 
republican  execrated ftbth name  of  ChaHesAlberC^dndpersua^d 
his  friend  the  village  tailor  aiida^eat  politician^  t^.rftise  theciy 
of  "  Abasso  tutti  i  re:  viva  la  arepuWic^!''  To'  this  >CRecd  tlie 
poet  remained  faithful  in  after-life»  and  it  ^as  ^n  a,  rc^l»)iean, 
although  law-abiding,  p^tform  tiiat  he  wgfs  in  iSK-retlurned'iis 
member  for  Lugo  di  Rooiagna.  On  thai  oceaaion'  'hb  m&de  a 
very  remarkable  speech,  which  deserves  bHftf  notiees^i^re  itonl^ 
on  account  0(f  its  fundamental  4ifferepce  !fr0m  anydectioneei*- 
ing  address  that  could  possibly  be  d^livemd  in>itliis  c«>uiitry. 
His  chief  fu-guiaent  isrtbe  fitnes9-ei  poets  fora  poltf^cal  care^, 
which  he  tries  to  provie  by  both  ancient  and  modem  ih8tant:*es^ 
Plata  be  says,  would  not  tolerates  poet  in  hi»feptiblic.  but  tlife 
Platonic  Republic  itself  was:  mot^  lyrical  than  aft-ode  of  Pindar* 
Solon,  OH'  the  other  hand,  composed  elegies-;  Mikon  t^enaed  the 
"Apologia  del  Popoiio  fd'Ingiiiljert^r*  Uhlaad  was  a  stanch 
advocate  of  liberty  in  the  Frankfort  Parjlaoieiit,  and  Lmnartrne 
braved  the  fury  oftheiriioob  lor  days  together,  •*  Perhaps  my 
adversaries  i^ay  exclaimi  -You  are  not  a  Milton  pr  an  Uhland 
or  a  Lamartine;'  'Neither  are  you  a  Plato,' I  should  reply/* 
Fancy  anyone  talking  of  Plato  and  Uhland;  and  liamartineto 
the  enlightened  electors  of  Gloucester  0|r  Boston,  and  -being 
rewarded  with  "  Ilaritaeapplausi,"  besides  obtaiping  the  seat. 

It  may  be  mentioned  in  this  connection  that  on  one  oooasioa 
Carducci  is  accused  of  having  sunk; his  stern  republicaA  priji^ 
ciples.-  It  appears  that  lie  was  introduced  to  the  Queen  of  Italy^ 
who  received  him. in  the  most  gracious  manner,  and  paid  hira 
the  compliment  dearest  to  the  poet  of  showing  intimate  ac- 
quaintance with  his  works.  Soon  afterward  Carducci  wrote  the 
ode  "Alia  Regina  d'ltalia,"  of  which  an:  enthusiastic  ^ublisber's 
circular  states,  "  Una  distintissima  copia"-^"priflted  on  parch* 
ment  and  bound  in  white  silk" — was  presented  to  Her  Majestft 
and.  wlHch  raided  a  »hau^of  derisioa  in'U^  Co98*fyatfv#*'Pie9l. 


CMiicd'^  .jmotive;  -anid/^evon'  th«  tmeanis^g'  oC  His '.vcrsesr  were 
misrepfdsented  tfi:  the  grossest  raannef,  till  atl^t  be  was  com* 
pelkxi  to  pobUib  an.  explanatory  letter^  Tq  tbe  >  putslder  it 
soems.fiatluml  enough  tkiftt  ev<Qii  a  republican  poet. need  opt  be 
debarred jfraiinid^idg  bonu^^e  toa. beaidtiiui  a«4  ^iftinguishpd 
tac^  because^  alte*haippena>t9  bQ  a  q^een. 

it  is^luiy  IQ  tb^  credit  ol  tbe,  Italian  Goyenuneot^s^^ii^-r 
deed»C3rdit<^iribifn3elf  aGknowledg<)9*Hi;hata  i9ano(  diaextfem^ 
yieira '  should 'nb(t^4»  aay^way  have  sMgciffd  la  bis  prof esS)iaai4 
career.  He  was*'  ou  tbe  OQHtrary^  f rom^  the  firf^t  treated  with,  tb^ 
disiiafitiofti  ^no.  doubt'  fnUjrdtf^nred  by  bi^  s«l^)av}y  att^Mm^nt^. 
In  ji^5f9rat  the  eariy  age  of  tweptynfive,  be^was^  appojiited  Pfo^ 
f^orof/G«eek  in ^ the  University, 4j>4  Pisia, jand  in^tliefollovv jng 
>^r  obtained  the^aafaedt^ingtfisn^  positlc^^t  3ologaat>wl^icl^ 
he^si^m.  hold&  ?  Otoly  >pn^<>ne  OQQ^io(i»  in  i8^>  he  i^ras  wi^h  twp 
ai^his  GcHleagnesHSus^nded;  foe  a  short  ticfte;  iqr  /s^gnjng  an^r 
dnessto  .Maanni^*"^  fitight  iajuryi  quite  excu^ble,"  Qar(4ucd 
himself  xemarks; "  in  those  d^s rof-  political  contention." 
,  Cardocci's  poetical  i^orkiis  comprised  und0<^  the  following 
UUes^,  V Juvenilia,"  "Levla  .Gravia, "  **. Decennalia*!'  "N^jov^ 
i?oeste."  andi**  Qdi;  Barbane/'.the^grst:  three  f>ubl*sbed  i^  axol- 
lectjed .  f^rm^  as  *'  PiOesie"  <Flomnc^.  the-  Ifist  two .  belonging  to 
the  pretty  Elzeyir<  edition  of.modi^n  poets  appearing  at  Bpiogiw^ 
it  must;  bef  churned  that  in  the  early  poems  there  is- little, to  be^- 
trajf  tjbefuttine  yeristaor  to  distingHrish  CardMcqi  from,  the  pchoql 
af  literature  then- iposti  ia  vagtie..  The  stately  march  pi  hi^  stan- 
za •the:  dig>nified  grace  of  the.idio%iong;do  no^  in  any,  w^  differ 
fi?cxmrtj^, style 0f  Montiand-Mananni.  And  tbecft, is  little  vari- 
sttiontof  manner-tn  the^tneatoicnt  of  the  varipus  ijubject^ ;  Venus 
s^  Bacekus  swre  rftily  invoked  i*  a  love  song  or  a  '■  brin^isi'*  is 
attempted,  and  the  patriotic/  addxesees  t^  ."'Liberty"  and  the 
italians^^re  full,  of.tlieelassiie  jnagniloqueneeof  Ai^i^to  wbotx^, 
iildeed,  the  foroser  is  dedicated^  ;  - 

,7  .The  pheatomenoo  is  -  ^sy-  of  ^  e^splaa^oktion^  Carducgi  '&  father 
l^iai|(.«i«  #aAfeL»&efin*  a<ist«iifih<^M2ift9Qoiap^;.ift94'  tbo.p^^t 


i§2  r}f£  i/^i^jj^y  MA^dimB, 

himseff  joined  a  society  of  yiyvmg  \h%i^»ryttittnmhofm.wtkim;mif 
chance  of  Mlkm  poetry  in  t¥ft  '^titicv^dhertnce  moJl^pHMi 
models  of  the  medieval  and  R«iiais^nce  periods,  to  tks  Hadm 
slori  of  aH  foreign  a«d  m€Wte*«'^e*n*iii|g.  Ifwas  [a  tliftriiettawy 
organ  4^  ihh  'iftii&vemem,9\gniQcsanJbfiMA\pA^Amgf^ 
that  Carducci  earned  his'SrHiaurels^-and  lm>  siM^k)ttS'«auiieftat 
this  ^Mt  -^iitHed^  hi^"sybs^«i)tiy  to  appear  Mioiigst  the 
learned  editor^  of  l4i*  c^iarmkig'  ^'diaiBt^nd-'uedttioit'Of.  JtiHali 
daissi^  piilillsfhed  <by8arb^rs(.  1^^  poerkiiiiieelf  is  by  Jio  immmw 
ashamed  of  these  antecedents.  -^'I  <8tert«lv"  h©  writes,  "aad  i 
am  t^rottd  of  it,  frt>m  Alfieri/PaHnV  Montis  vS>wcdte,fijeop«fdfc; 
through  them  asid  i^h  tlKkn  i  Went  kmk  to  the  anideiitaian^ 
Inibued  mysdf  with  Dante  imd  Pmrnrdi/'  Tlie  ^ame  ttene  prti- 
vaiils  e^sekitiaHy  ill  the  *^  LeVia  OmvisU^^sMd  ^begiai  %o  disappear 
oftty  in  the  •*  DWjennfafia,'*'  6otnp^kitvg  i<h^  po0ni«k  mostly  polklcat, 
wftidt  were  4^itt«^n^tiring  «he  teti  4ifetnM  years  piecedingf  tbe 
oeenpatfonof  Ronne  by  the  Iialians.  The  la^t^naiDed  cdlectkNi 
contains  ohe^  the  author's  most  famous^  or  as  some  wwiM 
«ay  most  wbtoridus,  poems,  the  ^  Inino  a  Satana.''  whkh  on  its 
appearance  in  1869  evoked  all  the  thunid^rs  of  a  CoaservatiUlft 
press,  and  ih  the^tyes  Of  pious  persons  still  surrounds  the  poet 
^it^  a  sort  of  itiHd  iglow  of  unholiness.  A'ddllo  Bi^vgogni  re* 
lates  how  on^  evening  when  walkkig  with  the  poet  at  Bologna 
they 'Were  met  by  co  old  priest,  who  gr^«ted  Carducci  to  the 
m6st  cardial  manner.  Turning  to  Borgc^t' the  kind  cM,  man 
added :  "A  very  good  excellent  person  the  prtofe^or,  an-^ic^ 
lent  p)ersan1  What  a  pity  "he  sh6ald  have  wdtteii  *'Qv^ 
Demone*  r  meaning  the  "  Hymh  td<  Satan."  That  sucfe'a'titie 
alone  would  >e  sufficient  to  frighten  a  shnple-minded  priest  or 
a  ptours  lady  is  not  a  matter  for  ^rpri^e.  Those,  howevte*",  who 
had  the  courage  to  read  must  have  seen  that  Cardudci's  mean- 
ing is  n6t  qnitk  as  teriil>le  as  might  appear  at  first  sight*  Thie 
Satan  glorified  by  him  is  not  tbe*^  northern  phantom**^ of  die 
middle  agea  Justly  despised 'by>Mephistophete%<  nor  ly^  that 
^spirit  kA  tiegatioift  Iiim8etl^^{>erhaps.^he  .imareMuig  iwo^itf  alK 


^Vmom  d- Ju<)ff»«fit'*>i9'  Ihe.  iwarest  approach  to  a  pritu^pl^ 
y/lmk^  ait  once  tl^  "  kittg  ol  torms  and  phenomena  m  mauer**^ 
thQ^rit  of  i^oble  resMitaAce  which  tived.  in  Hussand  Sa^vanaroia 
and  Luther,  and  finally  the  "ribellione  e  forza  vindice  deUa 
regios^*'  It  may  be  readily  .adnoitted  that  in  this  sense  many 
enlightpi^  •  mem  a/re  ^evil^worshipers  botk  in  and  out  of 
It«Jy.  '  yi.  w^s^no  doitbt  this  perfect  rapport  with  the  spirit  of 
mod^Oi  progfOM  which  attitacted  Cardueci'fr  ireaders,  and  mad€» 
him.t^A^ol  Ot  ItaUan,  more  especialiy  ctf    North    Italian/ 

J:h«:^fl|l3hUfeenury impoftaace  ^f  Cankicci'^work  belongs  ta 
a  ^pjoop^caitiv^l^.  l^t^r  period.  1st  his  career  the  process  of  sowv> 
log  wild  qaits  has  been  CMfiously  delayed.  Speaking  oi.  the 
"l^v^n^a^"  Ef^ricoj  P^nzacchJ,  pne^ol  the  leading  Italtaji  cftt*. 
ics«,iren(uu;k^  i/*li  ycmtb  in  artaa  in- life  signifies-  power  and  lib^ 
ei^,  %h&tith€.pf^j^&  of  ,C^dac,ci>  a(  foirty  ajre  more  juvenile 
thfi^^tjbpse  he^^rpl^  a]t»  twenty."  This  process  of.r^^eration 
\&i^ccQ\xr}^(ir.iqr,  l^  th^.  ^udy  of  nmdeirn/ fooe^  literatures,  es- 
p^aUyth^^of  ;^r^pe£^d;Geraiiaay»  Victor  Hug^  in  the  ior- 
m^^and  i^eii^  my%hmls^%^  being  the. poets  to  whom  Carducci. 
sterns  totl^inl^,  hin^self  mosib  indebted*  Hence  the.  accusation. 
ofho^tUecriMc^  that-G^rduoci  ha&.beeit  all  his^  life,.  an4  remains* 
little  mor^  than  .a  ^kilU^^^aitd  learned  Temodeler  of  other  peo- 
ple's ideas^  that  l^e  l;»iegan  by  imitdting  Dantcand  Leopardi,  and 
e^dedjbjf  p^ia^c^ing  HeinQ  lM»d  the.  modern  FrencTi:  school. 
Ther^  jisr^  griMO  ol  jtru^th  to  a  .whole  heap  of  etroi^  in  this  sweep** 
u|g  asscrtioiK.  U  CardMcci  adopts  his  ideas  ixom  other  poets, 
h^.l^nows  %t  least  bow  to  remodel  them. in  bis  own  way  so  that 
h^4)y  ,a  trace  i^ .  th^  origin  remains.  He  has,  for  example,  in 
CQfmnoa  wth  V4ctor  Hugd,  a  perfect  horror  of  Caesart$m<  as 
represfsntedr  in  modern  tinies  by  the  Bonapartes;  and  he  than-^ 
d^fs  against  the  vice^  ol  noyiil  Versailles  as  if  all  philosophers 
mpA  R^poblicaaa — Dkierot*  and  Mirabeau,  and  Danton->^had 
hjfif^  nipf|^l^j[>|yYi(?#!!^.  ,  PMt.^t;  these  conclusions  a  stanch  Re> 
puja^ican  might  well  arrive  without ^b^jaiiLof  the^gasBat^Fi^ochi 


^54  THE  UBRAItY  JdACAZlNS. 

poet.  And  here^aa  to  as>L  cair  ^ecf 'Caftl«cer«  indebtedness 
ends,  if  one  excepts  a  certain  imore  personal  and  less  conven- 
tional pathos  which  distinguishes  his  later  from  his  earlier 
work. 

It  is  very  similar  with  the  relations  of  the  Italian  poet  to 
Heine.  Froin:him  he  is  said  to  have  borrowed  his  "  paganism." 
Now  Heine's  paganism  was  never  of  ^  gfennine  or  of  a  lasting 
kind.  Even  when  he  was  in  the  full  vigor  of  health »  and  when 
the  golden  diicats  of  his  unde  Salomon  jmgled  in  his  pockets, 
his  enjoyment  of  life  and  beauty  was  mingled  with  the  melan- 
choly note  of  romanticismi  When  e^Eperteifce  ^nd  ifhieiss  had 
chastened  him  and  developed  the  true  gtefctness^Of  •  Ws  genius 
the  n&ask  of  Greek  optimism  fell  from  his*  face.  ''For  the  old 
gods  he  has  only  a  rc^etful  farewell  in  *Les  Dieux  en  Exil>" 
and  the  .finest  of  his  poems  is  concerned  wkh  a  true  man  of  ^r- 
row.  the  roediflBval  Jewish  poetv  Jehuda  ben  Hakvt.  Of  all  this 
theire  is  oot  a  trace  in  CardvJicci.  He  Is  ar  genuhie  imd  healthy 
pj^an  in  the  style  of  Goethe^  or  perhaps  stiM'  more  in  tharof 
Piacen^  Heine's  ignai  enemy,  whom  Carducci  quote*  freqaently. 
and  with  whom  (he -shares  the  lote  of  ^classical  meters.  The 
lossonhe  has  learued  from  the  modem  poet  is  of  a  negative  rather 
than,  of  a  positive  kind.  In  the  "  Nuove  P<^»ie"  his  style,  with- 
out Ipsing  anythivig^  of  its  sonorous  breadthris  more  simple,  and 
therefore  more. intense.,  moie- personal.  •  Tlie  im^ryalso  has 
grown  in  boldness  i  and  color.  Sffid  the  tyipiieal  dMies  of  Gfeek 
roythology.are  less  freqmently  called  npon.*  Ii^  addHton^to  this 
the  subject  matter  is  more.substamiali  nf^ore  tangible.  Instead 
of  vague  addresses  to  Italy  or  Liberty  we  ha\«e  now  st  meihorial 
poem  on  the  battle  of  Mentana,  and  another  "On  the  Seventy- 
ninth  Anniversary  of  the  French  Rerpoblic,  filst  September. 
1 87 1.*'  To  quote  detached  portions  of  these  poems  would  give 
little  idea  of  their  continuity  of  thought  and  of  t*i^r  'foi*ce  of 
doclftmatory  pathos.  It  will  be  better  txj  give  the  final  stSn^as 
of  the  address  to  the  *'  wild  eotirsm*.*'  his  genius  with  Which  the 
poetfitrefacesJu&**NeAv^oagSv';.    .'     .     -     -      'o---  ^-^•♦"- 


J/OaXSJKA^  ITAMAl^  PORTS,  255 

■  '{    i    C0riiaiiid«gli«nNnikrii3ovni]fctaMe«ifait£      .   •- 
E  a  noi  rida  Tapril ! 

L'apri)  ^^  ^^'  itf^icl  yw^\  di  i^pwi  ;e  .fiorj  , 
L'april  san^o.deir  anima  piena  di  nu9vi  amori 
■*     '     *    '  ■>      /-  L*aprile  (del  i5ens!er.' 

Voliap^ sin, cbela iol^pr^ |di Gk)vie  tra la ?oUa-  ^ 

Nubc  ci  arda  e  punfichi,  o  che  il  torrente  inghjotta 
-•••••'    '•♦  ^       '•'•'*'■  dafviHortarrilicr.'  '*  '" 

-,.''.-     •       .''■    ^  ■-:.'.   I  ;.."•   ,.',■.!■,'!.■::   -^       •.         fi      r.. 
O  cbMo  disceqda  placido  dal  tuo  stellanteiu-clone 
'    Ctfh  l*<itdiiio'anc<5fa[*grtivfd6  in  Iwbcc  vision^    i     •    '■    '     *'    '*  ' 
,.i    .,  .  1.  '.vAi  ';.i  .'  i\     -}  'Sul4M0EMio:i*to«Sdl.i.  ^i   '■-■  * 

'        Ea  ai'fraterno  ^umulo  posTcIa  la  fatica. 

His  clifthajt'  of  deV^lopftiei^t  Ctfrdticd  has;  accordifi^  ^6  sGink 
<^hy  lirttk^  tiBftcHed  !hJ  hi^4dst'V61urtt6.'the  ^•Ocfi  eartrdre,"* 
The  title  immediately  suggest?  Leconte  de  Lisle's  **  Poemes-Bki*- 
bares,"  but  those  woalcJbejeptirely  mistaken  M'ho  from  a  kindred 
name  would  guess^t  a  j&bidiwd  spirits  H«;re,  indeed,  the  differ- 
eat  instincts  of  French  and'lteliatilftfefafttif^  are  strikingly  illus- 
trated. The  ••  Parnarissiens"  and  their  great  master  and  model, 
V1«:t>r'«u^ii^6i**tftftei€'df^>ftid»l8E^^ReHaissah  T*he 
ltali44  mk¥(J*irti*tih<Jtf^My^a&hb«rs't^e'  Middlfe^  Age^,  knd'^esee' 
aGcordif*gfjFthM'tl»6'  leid6¥iof- tbe'verlsti  bMbose^  ^)ag^i^ni'fbr 
bis  fettttte-cty,'^^^  «ffesf  tJo  revive  •f*6«at5kti'yetffr&:'  fri  these- 
o^et^rs^th^  ffOtfi  Biiarfe*#e!'"ai-e  wfltterii'fliWl  brt*t?hat'^fc<5c6{iht'  ex- 
tolk*i'tto*thte-skMd  by' 'fenthiisra^tife'  Itkliang;:ihd''nbt  */them^ 

aloBC.    Th^  -cetebbted-  Prof.'JMommsert  ts  a  gtfeat  ^rf^'h-er  of 

— ,-«, —  ».^'--i*(ii — "mo   111 — ijii,  >>)  ,. •■■.•.{  *  u — ;,  «;?»,   f  .J.;.'  ,;-r;-t.t;.  j   ■» 

♦  \'  I^^  u^;iVi5^9^  |l>e  liea4ft,av»d;^caat§  9^  .t^ifl'^B^mij^i  .let,||ie  V*<M  of^he 
monsters  dye  purple  thy  iron  knee-caps  ;  and  on  us^shalj  smile  April— the  Aprjl  of 
Italian  h/Us,tt<ih'Wit6Har  vests  aild  ItoVerS  ;  the  /holy  ApriTof  the  soul,  full  of  new* 
ldv« ;  iftd  A^  of  tlfdogHi;'  rLdt>U9^'tIy  tmth^  liichtnfnir't)^  Zeltd  f rdm  tile  dcUttcM'etf 
c}9M4(^rfl  ^P4  P"r»^Vfv*«'  MJIih? «MTep*» e«»«ilif  Jwrse .an4  rider.  ;Or/ti|I14!&- 
sceni  calmly  from  vour  starry  s^ddl^.  wjth  my  ey^s,  fitill  besiyy  from  thQ  iighj.and 
the' vision,'  on  my  Tuscan  soil,  to  rest  from  niy  fatigue  on  my  brother^s  tomb,  while 
jovt uate  tile ^lif^'ftotii^ a  beautilul ahtk|ue nana,' t<iwaM' th^  dyitag* «un.*'  '■•\^'  ■ 


?56  vim  S^BM'ity  MA€iAZmAi, 

these  odes,  and^lms  kinisdlf  translated  ^sevetad  4>fiJiem  into  Ger- 
man. In  spheof  this  high  authority,  and  atth^i-isk  of  being 
classed  among  irresponsible,  indolent  reviewers,  I  must  own  thafC  I 
cannot  see  the  valuc'Of  these  metrieai  eJipcilmetits- in  a  language 
which  has  not  only  lost  the  sense  of  quantity,  but  even  to  a  ^reqit 
extent  that  of  rhetorical  accent.  The  latter  is  the  vital  metrical 
principle  in  English  and  German,  but  the  romapce  language 
have  abandoned  even  this  J?ist  rhythmical  stronghold,  and  .iH(W3- 
ure  their  verses  entirely  by  the  number  of  syllabies.  That  even 
on  this  principle  fine  rhythmical  effects  may  b^^  produced  by 
great  poets  is  a  tcuisai  w^ioh  need  not  be  here  insisted  upon, 
but  it  is  a  very  different  thing  where  a.cerjain.  Aythm  is  to  be 
repeated  in  a  o^rtalg  pai^  of  (^^chline..  Hore  tbc>  impotence  of 
the  modem  language ^jecomev  noticeable  at  every  step*  I  doubt 
M  ^n  ju^wsuy  reader  woul4^&ufP<<^  H^ratiAP,  |f9fft^,  if»dbtl^fallO|v- 
ing  dainty  st^aiwa  ^4d£es$ed  Jto  U^dk^  t^  prosAdJfig^fHy  <^ ii^ 
'0<ti';.:  ^    .   ■     -■      !  ■■•  -'■>_  --'    .   •■  -.r..'  ,      '.   .; 

O  deviata  veadc  solitudine 
'  Lungidalrutnbrd^gHuomhii! '  ' 

To  ma  the  mo«^  sM<^«W  fes^t«of  *ft«tt|«eari$hA<^|ib)i«K::5{ 
of  rhyn^,  which  i^^  to  i9ey  ^i^^Ma^ol  ^o^^l^iff^mi^  Ai^.tte 
same  time  U;  is  yeqrpps^blje  tiiat,  ,aA  Italian  ?ear,f|ia^  4i9afW^ 
subtle  b^ut^cs^f  f  l^ythm^nd  jpi^eMy  hi^diaii  fcpm  xh^^Ptgo^T. 
And  tt^ft  ;Bame,Te?erv^ipf>  sho»ki^  iwde  m  iJMdgi%'iof  Gar- 
<Uicci's.  literary  in^pprtanoQ  in  iu  .^eattfety*  He  is  ippt^a* lyrical 
poet,  and, seldi^  t^ouches  ^e  bqart;.  .<  His  sttb^^ic^  ^f^  indeed, 
seldom  chosen  with  such  a  view,  being  in  most  instances  sug- 
gested by  the'  great  ^events  aftd  the  leading  v&€^  of  tfhe  present 
day.  For  all  these  he  finds  an  expression  fully  satisfactory  to 
the  rising  generation  of  Italians,  who*  imoreoiwer,  ftdmife  the 
nobility  <5f  his  thought  and  diction;  the  depth  of  his  %chol^^ 
Ship.  Atl  this  glve^  hirrt  a  pronilnent  jjlace  in  the  modern  de- 
velopment of  4iis  couotry ;  but  it  i«  of  CQurse  4ifbrQBit  wh^ihis 


A  NIGHT  ON  MOVNT   WASHINGTON.  25? 

posittoa  in  Internatiomil  literature  comes  to  be  examined.  The 
latter,  however^  is  of  little  importance  for  our  present  purpose. 
It  was  the  aim  of.  this  article  to  show  that  Italian  poetry  has 
entered  upoa  a^^new  phase,  which,  whithersoever,  it  may  ulti- 
iaateiy  lead^  has  at  any  late  the.  sympathy  of  the  ypux^  and  the 
intelligent  among  the^natioiv*  By  the  side^^pf  thM  fact  jtkfi;  i^ice 
distinctions  of  more  or  lesa  individual  m^it  are  of  comparatively 
little  significance^ 

F&jhNCis  HusPFER^  in  the  FoortnightJiy  Review. 


A  NIGHT  fON  MOUNT  WASHINGTON. 

The  Amerioans  were  a  ,long  time. discovering  th^  WJ;iite 
Mountains^  Not  exactly  c^iscovjering  ihenK  i^t  ,is  tru^  for  they 
are^seen  in  the  horizon  of  New  Knglund  from.^f^,  s^1d  in  the 
upper  portions  of  the  State  of  New  Hamps^hire  they  are  as^conr- 
spkuious  as  the  Welsh  mountains  from  the  west  of  England*  or 
the  Cumberland;  anid  Wes^tmoreland  hiijs  in  the  north,  f  ven 
from  Portland  on  the  sea^shoire,  eighty  or  a  hundred  miles 
away,  the  niountain  range  stretches,  along  l^he  south-western 
hodTon,  and  in  a  clear  day  the  ^las&i^  .fcffm  of  Mount  Wash- 
ington, \%  seen  above  allies  Ae|ghbors.,  But  though  the  hills 
wereJcnown  to  exist,  nobody;  thought  ol  exploring  them.  ,  The 
inhabitafits  of  a.  new  counlry  h^ye.np  time  tp  igll  in  loye  with 
thepidur^esque^  The  battle  with,  the  fore^  and  the  soil  is  too 
hard  and  too  universal  to  admit  of  p^i^nic  excursions  in  pursuit 
cA  the^UJirise  qr  thQ  sunset.  Anjd  soothf  to  say,  if  you  wish  to 
see  beautiful  sunrises  and  sunsets  in  New  Ei;i^laj>d.  you  do  not 
need  to  go  very  far  for  them.  The  veranda^ot  the,  frame  hc^se, 
qr  Its  bedroom  window,  will' in  ntiost  oases  afford  admirable  op- 
portunities for  feasting  the  eyes  of^, these  glories  of,  the  sky. 
We  shall  not  readily  forget  the  woiulefful  succession  of  autumn 
sttijisets.  Wrhich  evening  .after  evening;  presented  themselves,  as 
•we  satswii^ng.  ont^erQckil»s^chair-in  th^v^randa  pf  a  friend V 
L.  M.  8.— o 


258  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

house,  with  the  beaotiftt!  Contteetieut  River  and  vallejr  before 
lis.  And  the  exquifeite  ca!m  thAl  breathed  from' the  'artit)er  sky 
after  the  sun  had  set,  atid  from  the  bosom  of  the  ri^'er,  ^'here 
crag,  ^nd  tree,  and  sky  were  kll  so  softly  mfrrored,  ^terned  to 
supply  ^  that  cobl^^  and  reposb  that  tbiHrig  tnen  and  wom^ 
needed  after  the'heat  and  burden  df  the  day.         '  *   '••    - 

It  Ts  !ittlewdftder,- therefore;  thkt  for  the^great^  p^rt^of  hro 
centuries  the  White  Mountains,  and  Mount  Wii^ihgtoil  iheii- 
king,  wetTe  virt-iraHjr  tihktiown:  '  After  ^H/-\^ hat* did  people  in 
Scotland  know  of  the  Trosachs  and  Lake  Katrine  before  Sir 
Walter  Scott  ?  or  of  Rydal  and  Grasmere  before  Wordsworth  ? 
There  arediscov^f^tr  ilnd^  ^^tkeitxi:  THe  White  Mountains 
as  protuberances  on  the  earth's  surface  were  one  thing;  as  the 
hdm^s  6f  pictureisque  beatity  i^mte  -anotlier.  The  Americans  . 
have  found  them^drthkhowing  ih  th6  latter  sense,  and  so  mdy 
persons  more  l-emote.  To  niost  "fenglifehmfen,  we'believe',  they 
have  a  ver}'-  vague  arnd  sh^dbv^y  existence.'  AHthonyTrolTope. 
we  snppbse,  exjire^'sed'his  otvn  notion  before  seemg  thertn,  when 
he  ^id  that  by 'E?rtg!i^hmeri  rri  general'  they  w^^  sup|36^e<}  to 
lie  someWhere  between  the*  R6cky  Mountahis'  and  the  Alle- 
ghanieS,'and  to'be  homes  of  the  Red  Indian  and 'the  buflfald. 
To  him,  as  to  many  ti  istran^er,  it  Was  quite  k  -sufpHse  t6  find 
within  a  few  hours 'by  rail  fh>ni  "Boston  a  mbuntftirf  plateau, 
some  forty-five  rti ties  loVig  and  thirty  w^de,  fismghighet  thati 
any  mountains  in  Grekt  BHtaln,  and  claiming,  though  not  with- 
out challenge,  to  be  called  the  Switzerland  of  New  England. 
As  for  Red  Indians  and' buffaloes,  it^is  perhaps  unfortunate  that 
there  are  none  thereabout.  If  there  had  been  riesident  Red  In- 
dians, the  grand  old  Indian  names  would  no  doubt  have  been 
continued  for  the  mountaihs,  afe  they  have  been  over"  all  Ameri- 
ca, for  the  rivers.'  What i^ the  result?'  Why. that  the  old  fiames 
are  discarded,  and  these  h6ary  Veterans,  thtit*(*krty  us  back  into 
the  dim  ages  of  the  geofogfcal  past,  are  now  distinguished  from 
one  afnothcr  by  nothirig^- better  than  the  few  mod ^rh  names  that 
America   ddights  to'  honbh     Thter^ly  liitmnt  WebStCr  IU1<1 


A  NIGHT  ON  MOUNT  WASHINGTON  259 

Mooot  Adams  and  Mount  Fjrankliet  and  Mo^t  J^ffecson*  and 
so  forth,  and». towering  of  j^urae  above  thepa  i^«  Mount  Wash- 
ingtom  Wie  cannot  s«^  we  4ike  the  choice.  K  seeio^  to  scamp 
litUeneas  ^hezie  nature ^as(giMeii.majiesAy*,a^d  u>  qov^r  the  n^r 
noorials  of  theougfa^r  past.mth  thei m^morieil  of  yesterday.  In 
some..greai:moi«ntainbtlttM.  you  S0e  on  ;^  POfite  tJi^^^evident 
Bsaicka  olgUctiia  tsxic^  aiidiyou^are^iar^Fi^  h$ifikJn^nmgination 
to .  the  far i  cHstei^li vage  when  ioe  reigned  in.  hovy  majep^  over 
the  whole  J^egi^n.  When,  you  karn  tthait  the  9M>Mntain  be^rs  the 
name  of  Jacksoa  or  Webster,,  you  seem  to  hftvii^iQwnd  ^le  ?tep 
between  tlie,atthUn»e  and. the. ridicolpus,     ;  .  .  . 

It  is  iesd  than>ft  hi»ndred. years;  since  Moiwt  We^hingtoni 
which  the  Indiana.oaUed  Agiochook»  receiYet^its^ipr^entn^ni^ 
ItJs.Iittle  mor&than.hialf  tlvi^  time  since  thQ  tot  foQtpat,hw9^ 
made  to  thesummit.^  Abotiit' twenty  yearst^ ago  a  path ior  <^-r 
riages  was  completed..,  in.  iS^  a  r^i^Mray  .w^  begun,  and  cofnn 
pleted  iaj869.  ,.The  height  of  the 4no!i*ntai^  is  $,^93  feet,  spn\e 
five  hundred  more4^an>  any  ot  the, svdiaaent. hills.  There, Jiave 
been  hotels. on  the  top  fe>r)abQu*.thii:;tyj^?a|s,oqcaftioi^lly  blown 
down  by  stoijD5fcs*^,i;rhe,pr*se«t;fe)^el^  rS»in,|ai^,  Hous^/'  dates 
from. 1372,  ,    ,      .  ..,.-.  "  .•  .  r.  .      •  t        ..1  ,n  .....*    < 

If  thft  Americans  m^  liuteiof  .tb^  WWte-MpuQtaHiis  daring 
the  eariy  period;  of  therr  hist^vy^t^ey  have*  a» ply  ;eofppensa^ed 
their  >e^rly  iiegJect^y, what Jthpy.BwJ^ of  tb^m  noF^,  Th^  dis- 
trict is  ttow  tr^versod  by  ffailtfrays  bringing'  xi^  tonrist  aj&  near 
to  the  mountaifis  as  the  ii^tnre  of  the  coumtry  allows.  Wjhftfje 
the, railway  cannot  her  built„  or  rather  where  .it  h^  not  been 
budt  as  yet,  stagecoaches  supply  its  place»r  /Hotels».accomrao* 
dating  four  or  &ve  hundred  guests,  havebeon-run  upat  various 
coavenient.poiots^of  the  district,  reaqhed  jeA^hert^y  the  railway 
or  the  .road,  ;*Very  often,  theee  hotels  with-  their  annexes  ^d 
offices  are.  the  o^x*-^^^^  within,  reaoh  pf  ,the'/vailway  station. 
If  you  see  "  Faji^an"  or  ":Crav«[fojd  "  on  the  m^r  do  nc^  flatter 
yourjselt  that  ili.te  ft.city,  or;  Qvmn  ^  town  or  vijlage>wiith  iho^ses, 
stor^a,  and  f3^ttor>  i^3iitutio9»  .surronnding*    Iv  >  Jlimply  Fa* 


26o  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

byan's  Gt  Citavi^l^d*s  housie  or  k©Ul,'  wiih  iu  eimrbntnente.  ^ 
And  tiGitableiMMises  they  are>  indeed,  to  be  louod  in  tbe  heart 
of  w^at  Wfti^  fbt^ntty  a  wUdemefiB.  At  Fabyan's^  where  we 
spent  a  d^^r^WO/ in' addition  to^^ken^Utlbulh^f  thane  are 
two  fsedi^odm  H^ii8^>  aeodMHAodatkig:  iQ  MJifmx  6t  five  .hun^ 
dred.  Tlie  drawlng^i^oom  te  otte  haiMtredi  feet  im  lei^th/ with 
other  dimeti^ofisr  e6tifesp<»idii$g.  Tlve^q^ster  inokides-  aanes 
from  aM  ptitt9(  ^f  the  Uirited  States^  but  h^dtyaiyf  from  £ng- 
land  or  the  Coiithiteiit.  It  is  a  parely  AmerlGaa^hoase,  Every- 
thing is  arranged  in  American  ia$hionand  at  American  houvs*— 
breakfast,  dinner,  and  supper.  Should  i^ou  happen  to  arrive 
midway  between  the  canonical  pericMls  sacred  to  these  neals, 
you  must  amuse  your  appetite  as  you  best^:£m  till  the  doors  of 
the  Salte-a^manger  are  thrown  open.  Thetallcofi  the  gentle- 
men is  all  American  poUti^  The  talk  of  the  ladixsis  Ameri- 
can gossip.  If  yo«i 'are  riot  an  Am'erkranir  ot  if  you  have  not 
American  friends;  you' are  a  ^h  oiit  of  the  water,  and,  indeed, 
it  is  something  of  pmsufoption  for  you  «o  b^  here  at  all. 

What  is  rails  iiiAmerkaj  the  waH6fs  are  ait  yKMittg  women. 
A  glance  isenoug^  td  show  that^  though  ^acting  i^w  in  a  menial 
capacity,  they  do  not  belong  to  a  menial  class.  Their  faces  are 
intd^igent,  their  manner  smart  and  self-^ssessed,  their  fingers 
lithe  and  usually  adorned  witl^  jewelry.-  Wh^  are  they?  Daugh- 
ters of  New  Englatid  farmers,'Of,  if  you  prefer  it,  landed  proprte- 
tors,  who  have  no  intention  of  devoting  their  lives  to>  service, 
but'  have  coi^  here  lor  a  season  to  see  a  little  of  the  worlds  and 
itt  a  few  weeks  wHl  return  to  con^plete  their  education,  or  b^n 
life  in  a  different  way.  An^  American*  friend  wasced  eloquent  to 
us  over  them.  "No  such  jroung  women,*'  he  said,  *•  in  all 
America.  They  make  splendid  wives.  Presidents  and  govern- 
ors have  married  such'  young  women,  and  r^ht  well  off  they 
have  been."  We  could  believe  it  all,  for  th^  faces  were  intelli- 
gent, the  styled  work  purpose^Iike,  aiid  th&  baring  of  (he  girls 
evhficed  thorough  seH-respec^  >  At  meab,  the  Salle^^  manger  is 
arranged  ki  tables  placed  ^ro^-way&  along  ekter  sii^  loithe 


A  NIGHT  ON  MOUNT  WA$H^NQTON  26l 

room,  with  |^es  for  a4<^Eon  at  eacb«  A  niQ^t^er'in'Chief  re- 
ceives  you  at  the  door,  and  assigns  you  your  table  and  place 
The  bill  of  fare  is  as  ample  and  varied  as  in  the  best  city  hotels^ 
and  )«>u  order  whsuever  you  like.  -  The  gjri  in  waiting  receives 
your  order,  and  quickly  your  dishes  are  .planted  round  you. 
That  is  to  say,  your  minor  dishes  are  nng/td  round  your  princi- 
pal oae — ^your. butter,  potatoes,  tomatoes,  peas;  tumif^  squash, , 
or  whatever  else  o^  v^^etable  produce  you  have  called  for,  make 
up  a  little  solsM?  system  around  the  central  clish  of  beef  or  mat- 
too,  till^  under  your  exertions,  the  whole  syatent  is  annihilated, 
and  the  next  course  begins.  For  iiqu<MV.the  carte,  offers  you 
wines  and  liqueurs  ^aailpld,  bat  the^  are  seldom  called  for. 
lee  water  is  almost  the  o^ly  tipple.  ^  The  hotel  has  a  bar,  hid 
away  in  some  put-offthe-way  comer,  which  gentlemen  ificHoed 
thereto  may  (ipd  and  Irequent  as  they  p]ease>  But  women  aitd 
children  are,  >fpr  the  most  part,  practical^  teetotalers,  fiod  thus 
upper  American  society  is  secured. one  element  of  purity;  wom- 
en are  not  winerbibbers,  and,  however  mueh  they  may  be  inter- 
ested in  their  eatings  drink  water  only. 

Fai^an's  istbe  ciOBt- convenient  poi«t  for  tbei ascent,  of  Mount 
Washington,  the  vpiyimmmit  pi  which,  or  tip-top,  as  they  call 
it^  may  be  reached  by  railway.  You  may  rise  from  yourchaif 
iii^  t^e  hojtel,  step  a<^ros8f  the  platform  into  the  car,  an4,  wkh  a 
siogle  chaage  of  ;caEs<  3t^  o^t  six  thousand  lee^Q  and  o^ore  above 
the  level  pi  the  se%  The  ^rst  five  or  six:  miles  arc  aloAg  the 
lovely  and  pxpstot  no  feature  of  much  Interest..  Wheii  you  reach 
^le.  ''.base"  statl<i>^  you  change  into  the  mouatainr  car.  It  is 
much  the  sa^ae  as  an  ordinary  American  car,  accommodating 
probably  fifty  passengers.  In  ascending  the  Rigi  in  Switzerland 
by  raiA  you  are  placed  with  your  back  to  the  t<^,  but  in  ascend- 
ing Mount  Washinj^tofi'  you  sit  k)  iheiisual  way.  T-he  .engine 
ifi  ifoehind  and  poshes  yoUr  and  i«  deseen4iog  iit  is  i»  front,  ar- 
r^ing  the  motion.  The  principle  on  whii^h  t^  engine  works 
is«he  same  as  at -the  Rigi-Hth^ne  is  a  iic^Checl  rail  midway  be- 
tween theordinary  rails,  into  which  a  cog-wtmHrom  the  engine 


26i  T^E  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

fits.  The  rate  of  wfdtfon  is  abotit  three  rtitei  an  lidiir.  At  first 
the  noifee  of  the  eog-wbcd  is  loud  and  disfigrcedble,  but  in  a 
few  minutes  you  Refused  co  it.  And  as  you  proc^d  a  miracle 
could  hardiy^pffoducd  a  more  remarkable  sensatirtrf.' '  Abdvcf  you 
you  see  the  rbad  mounting  ovei*  a  huge  precfpite-  and  fey  some 
strange.  nH«ai*d-lHtfc  jX)iiret.  you  Are  swiftly  aHd'st^dfljrb6rne 
up.  Roufid a <*urve you  s^hn^aitr fabrie-^I^ndef  ivttn  ti^te!^ 
standing  with  Outsfcretched  liitibs  over  a  yaW^iftg  ^f.  Wlth^ 
out  a  moment**  fear^  <)i»  hesitation,  ydut*  v*'h?de'  paks<»^  o^«^r  th^' 
gulf,  and  you=are'safet)A'th<i'o^()b8ite  sid^r.  P^iff,  J«ff,  ()iiflf,  aftd" 
still  tlie^ofdis^Ex<JelWlef;'krtd  ks  you  lobfe  bia«kv?ii«f  you  see 
what  a  heigflw  you  have  reafche*?.  There  «re  ftfo'ptiisei^r  sta- 
tions as  at  i*ie' Rigi  alon^  tbe'linfe,  tbt  the  befet  ol  fea*ohs-^hat 
there  no'  inhabltatttfel  on  the  rffOumain  ^de.*  BM  l^vlcer'tre 
thhik,  the^rain  stops,  that  the- engine  trta/  be  -Waterfed: '^'Th*' 
conductor  is  obligiftg;  ilkiws  the 'pagsefngetst^g^otit'artd  scat-' 
terthem'ft**lve$  blfttl«  along  the  ttfoiwitairi  ^^^:'  ^Yotf  afrfef' gazing' 
on  the  view  toeloW.  Wbe«  you^^tffenltJoti  id'iWek^'tj/a'hfsS^ng' 
noise  from  above.  Can  3'OU  b^^ve  your'eyes9"»  Yotildok-  t!|j» 
and'Ste certaki of  yoiJT fcllo^-ef^atttfesalidfeg 'dowi* th* fafl^t 
a  velocity  of  soih€f  fifty  n*iles'6Wh6u¥.  ^00  Arid  that  th*y  seat' 
th6ffis€)ve$  on  a  little  sltSd'that  fiteon  Co  bnie  of  %hfe  rails,  lihd 
you  are  told. tteitWh^d^theif  tmi^t  i^ uhiiVi^ded-iAfey  catl*  tra^; 
vetisethe  wh^lfe  dl^ih^e,  fmni  ^Mim^h^t5C>=bdS6i  Mi  fbW  niiniitiis.' 
The  «ted  is  ilirrrfshfed  with  A  dr^,  aftd  in  ^ite  j5rrese?ftt  l^s«irice* 
the  vehicle  ti^d'io  b6  phlldi  U{>  befdr^^hey  i'eftctmdTobi'^tf^iii. 
Anything m<(!)f^nWtdiJ!ikd than  the dashirtgcoWi^ 6f  thte  lii^n  lit 
full  swing  yotl'can  hatdly  Tm4gine.  Broken  bOn<ts  or' brbkeri' 
heads  sometimes  occur,  but  to  on^  thoroughly^ a^l^  to  manfa|;e 
hissied«  and  ghtlirig'^ithout  interrijp^iori  from  top  to'  bottoihi 
the  motrohj  beyond  dowbt.  is  most  dtlightluT.  ' 

The  aftertiobnt  has  been  clear  And  sunn3r.  rind  ^ii>  View  of  the 
surrounding  couhtfy  is  glorious;  tbough  the  tn^nt!ains  fEt€ 
much  less-crowdidihanf  afouiid'th^  R^i,aitd\life  whote  sc^ttWy 
imich'1es8Jgftwd^ati*'varled»    As  we  asccndj  tJi^'vc^tiatibh  b*-* 


A   NIGHT  OiV  MOUNT   WASHINGTON  26^ 

comes  manifestly  more  Alpine.  The  trees  are  reduced  to  pine, 
and  the  pine  becomes  dwarfed  and  scraggy,  and  finally  disap- 
pears. The  rocks  become  rugged  and  irregular,  as  if  they  had 
hard  times  in  the  wintry  ice  and  snow.  We  are  yet  eight  or  ten 
hundred  feet  from  the  summit,  when  we  become  distinctly  con- 
scious of  a  whiff  of  vapor.  Perhaps  it  is  from  the  engine  ?  No, 
it  is  too  extensive  for  that,  and  now  it  seems  to  envelop  us  as  if 
a  vapor-bath  had  been  part  of  the  programme.  It  is  impossi- 
ble to  resist  the  conclusion,  that  we  are  caught  in  a  fog.  And 
as  the  sun  is  to  set  in  a  few  minutes  the  conclusion  is  but  too 
apparent  that  we  are  likely  to  be  baulked  of  our  expected  view. 
We  do  not  despair,  however.  We  remember  a  similar  journey 
up  the  Rigi  two  years  before,  when  we  reached  the  top  in  a 
storm,  and  could  not  see  the  one  end  of  the  Kulm  Hotel  from 
the  other.  Great  was  our  delight  on  that  occasion  when,  in  an 
instant,  the  fog  disappeared,  and  a  clear  bar  in  the  sky,  between 
the  clouds  and  the  horizon,  gave  the  sun  a  splendid  opportunity 
to  gild  the  whole  amphitheater  of  mountains,  and  disappear 
in  a  perfect  blaze  of  glory.  But  no  sunset  was  to  be  seen  from 
the  summit  of  Mount  Washington  to-night.  The  whole  body 
of  the  American  tourists  rapidly  made  up  their  minds  to  that, 
and  as  soon  as  they  had  registered  their  names  and  secured 
their  rooms,  abandoned  themselves  to  disappointment  and  to 
supper.  It  seemed  to  one  of  my  party  and  myself  that,  for  once, 
we  might  get  an  advantage  over  the  Yankees,  and  by  superior 
'cuteness  see  the  sun  set  after  all.  We  remembered  that  it  was 
very  near  the^  summit  that  the  mist  had  come  on,  and  that  a 
short  walk  would  bring  us  into  a  clear  atmosphere  again.  So, 
while  the  Americans  were  at  supper,  we  stole  down  by  the  car- 
riage road,  and  in  some  twenty  minutes  were  below  the  mist. 
The  summit  of  the  mountain  hid  the  sunset  proper,  but  not  far 
off  we  could  easily  see  the  clear  sky,  the  clouds  flushed  with  red, 
and  the  bright  green  vaMeys  below.  It  was  no  drawback  that 
the  atmosphere  around  us  was  still  charged  with  vapor,  which 
would  come  rushing  along  in  occasional  whiffs.     The  optical 


264  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

illusions  that  presented  themselves  between  the  light  and  the 
dark  were  very  curious.  We  would  observe  clear  silvery  lakes 
repwDsing^  in  perfect  stillness  where  no  lakes  had  ever  been  seen 
before;  or  a  bright  river  would  be  seen  wandering  among  the 
mountains,  all  the  more  remarkable  because  the  want  ot  streams 
was  wh^t  wc  had  remarked  as  their  most  conspicuous  defect  in 
the  daylight  view.  While  still  v/ondering  what  it  could  all  be, 
our  surprise  reached  a  climax  on  our  observing  a  splendid  blaze 
as  if  of  electric  light  streaming  out  in  silver  lines  from  a  single 
spot.  By  and  by  the  riddle  was  solved.  It  was  patches  of  the 
sky  we  had  seen,  of  that  white,  shining,  pearly  hue  you  often 
see  half  an  hour  after  a  bright  sunset.  The  dark  clouds  through 
which  these  white  patches  shone  completed  the  illusion.  We 
had  the  pleasure  (or  the  pain  ?)  of  thinking  that  no  eyes  but 
ours  had  seen  these  curious  sights.  Retracing  our  steps,  we 
were  soon  enveloped  anew  in  impenetrable  mist.  As  we  neared 
the  hotel  another  illusion  was  seen  that  reminded  us  of  the 
Hartz  Mountains.  Right  above  our  heads  a  gigantic  human 
figure  was  observed,  six  times  the  size  of  an  ordinary  man.  It 
moved  its  huge  legs  lilce  one  of  the  old  giants,  and  waved  a 
lantern  with  its  enormous  arm.  But  as  it  neared  us,  each  step 
diminished  its  bulk  one-half,  and  when  at  length  it  passed,  it 
was  but  our  own  size — an  ordinary  Yankee  coachman  going 
down  to  the  stable  to  look  after  his  horses.  It  was  not  difficult 
to  account  for  the  phenomenon — particles  of  mist  acted  as  niag- 
nifying-glasses  under  the  light  from  the  lantern,  hence  the  gigan- 
tic figure  of  the  man.  When  we  reached  the  hotel  we  found 
that  our  disappearance  had  caused  some  anxiety,  and  that 
opinion  was  divided  as  to  whether  or  not  we  had  fallen  over 
a  precipice.  The  most  anxious  of  our  friends,  however,  had 
been  soothed  by  being  told  that  the  road  was  so  plafn  that 
we  could  not  be  lost  unless  we  had  been  bent  on  committing 
suicide.         . 

It  was  the  beginning  of  August,  and  down  below  people  could 
hardly  bear  the  lightest  clothing;  but  it  was  cold  atop,  and  the 


r 


A    NIGHT  ON  MOUNT    WASHINGTON,  265 


hotel  on  the  summit  was  heated,  as  if  it  had  been  the  depth  of 
winter.  We  fancy  that  that  must  be  the  American  taste,  but  it 
did  not  suit  us.  Our  little  bedroom  was  like  an  oven,  and  be- 
tween the  hot  dry  air  within,  and  the.  mist  outside,  breathing 
was  reduced  to  great  difficulty.  The  night  brought  little  sleep 
and  less  refreshment ;  there  was  little  fear  of  our  committing 
the  mistake  of  Mark  Twain  on  the  Rigi,  and  sleeping  tiW  after- 
noon, as  his  *' Tramp  Abroad"  had,  just  been  informing  us. 
With  the  first  streak  of  dawn  we  were  at  our  window,  delighted 
to  find  that,  saving  an  occasional  whiff  from  the  north,  the 
mist  had  disappeared,  and  that  there  was  the  prospect  of  a  full 
view  of  the  sun.  In  a  short  time  a  bell  rang  loudly,  and  before 
five  o'clock  the  platform  in  front  of  the  hotel  showed  all  that 
variety  of  impromptu  toilets  usual  on  such  occasions.  Nothr 
ing  couid  have  been  finer  than  the  dawn.  While  silver  was 
stealing  over  the  sky,  a  puff  of  mist,  as  it  rolled  up  from  a 
neighboring  valley,  would  suddenly  glow  with  a  bright  red  flush, 
and  as  suddenly  pass  away.  By  and  by  the  sky  showed  its 
brightest  tints  of  blue  and  green,  and  the  clouds  their  richest 
crown  of  gold.  Then,  on  the  edge  of  the  horizon,  came  a  speck 
of  dazzling  ruby,  expanding  with  provoking  rapidity  into  a  slen- 
der red  bow,  then  into  a  spotless  semicircle,  and  finally  a  globe 
of  molten  gold.  All  round,  the  sea  of  summits  was  bathed  in 
the  tender  pink  of  an  Alpine  dawn,  patches  of  cloud  gleamed 
on  the  mountain  sides  like  masses  of  opal,  and  below,  the  val- 
leys shone  out  in  their  freshest  green.  In  a  brief  half  hour  the 
^lory  was  over.  The  svin  and  clouds  had  become  common- 
place, the  poetical  appetite  of  the  spectators  was  satislied,  and  a 
new  appetite  gave  signs  of  great  activity,  for  every  one  was  ask- 
ing when  would  breakfast  be  ready  ? 

Breakfast  was  not  to  be  ready  for  three-quarters  of  an  hour. 
It  was  very  hard.  However  sleepy  you  may  be,  you  cannot 
sleep.  You  have  got  unsettled,  and  a  meal  is  necessary  to  re- 
store your  equilibrium.  The  three-quarters  of  an  hour  seem 
like  three  hours.      At  length   breakfast  comes,  your  prosaic 


266  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

wants  are  satisfied,  and  there  remains  only  the  settling  of  the 
bill  before  you  are  ready  to  begin  the  descent. 

Of  course  there  are  all  sorts  of  souvenirs  of  Mount  Washing- 
ton to  be  had  by  those  who  care  for  them.  The  only  one  thkt 
particularly  took  our  fancy  was  the  daily  newspaper.  It  was 
truly  characteristic  of  America  to  print  a  daily  newspaper  there, 
and  to  draw  particular  attention  to  the  fact  that  it  is  the  only 
daily  paper  in  the  world  printed  oh  the  top.  of  a  mountain. 
Among  the  Clouds,  as  it  is  called,  cannot  lay  claim  to  any  extra- 
ordinary amount  of  originality.  The  news  is  limited  to  a  record 
of  the  weather  at  the  signal  station  on  the  previous  day,  last 
night's  arrivals  at  the  hotel,  and  a  few  notes  from  the  adjacent 
tourist  stations.  Such  sublunary  matters  as  the  presidential 
contest  or  the  war  in  Afghanistan  created  little  or  no  interest 
so  far  above  the.  surface  of  the  earth.  The  life  of  the  paper  is 
limited  to  two  months  of  the  year;  hotel-keepers  and  railway 
companies  use  it  for  advertising;  beyond  that,  it  must  be  con- 
tent to  be  reckoned  a  curious  toy. 

There  are  three  ways  of  getting  down  from  Mount  Washing- 
ton ;  first,  by  the  railway,  which  most  of  the  visitors  preferred ; 
second,  by  a  stage-coach,  along  a  road  which  winds  over  a 
shoulder  of  the  mountain,  reaching  **  Glen  House"  after  an 
eight  miles*  ride;  and  thirdly,  by  the  same  road  on  foot.  Two 
of  us  preferred  the  last  of  these  methods,  while  another  mem- 
ber of  our  party  took  a  place  on  the  coach.  Nothing  is  more 
surprising  to  English  tourists  than  the  want  of  inclination  for 
walking  shown  by  Americans.  As  far  as  we  could  learn,  there 
was  but  one  pedestrian  besides  ourselves.  The  coach  had  a  fair 
complement  of  ladies  and  gentlemen.  It  was  provided  with 
three  pairs  of  horses,  not  for  the  descent,  but  for  the  upward  or 
return  journey — six  handsome  grays,  that  looked  quite  stylish. 
It  did  seem  to  us  for  a  moment  an  awkward  question  what 
would  happen  if  one  of  these  animals  were  to  take  a  frisky  fit 
on  the  edge  of  a  precipice.  It  soon  occurred  to  us,  however, 
that  horses  that  have  to  drag  a  heavy  coach  daily  up  eight  miler 


A  NIGHT  ON  MOUNT  fVA  SUING  TON,  267 

of  loose  sandy  road  to  the  top  of  a  mountain  no  less  than  four 
thousand  feet  above  the  base,  must  have  all  their  frisky  moods 
pretty  well  taken  out  of  them  in  the  course  of  the  climb,  and 
may  safely  be  trusted  to  perform  the  descent  like  lambs.  At 
the  same  time  we  were  not  without  some  anxiety  about  the 
safety  of  the  friend  who  had  taken  a  seat  on  the  coach.  We 
comforted  ourselves  by  the  thought  that,  as  there  seemed  to  be 
do  drinking-places  on  the  mountain,  the  driver  must  be  sober, 
aawi  the  driving  would  be  very  careful.  By  and  by  we  came  to  a 
part  of  the  road  where  a  great  smash  had  evidently  occurred' 
recently  among  the  trees.  An  American  gentleman  told  us  that 
a  month  before  the  coach  had  been  upset  at  that  spot,  a  lady 
killed,  and  two  or  three  other  passengers  seriously  wounded. 
"How  was  it  possible,"  we  asked,  ** to  upset  the  coach  at  such  a 
place?"  "  I  believe,  sir,"  replied  our  informant,  "the  coachman 
was  drunk." 

The  first  half  of  the  descent  is  over  a  very  rough  part  of  the 
mountain,  and  one  needs  to  be  careful  as  to  apparently  *'  near 
CtttSi"  We  saw  one  that  was  very  tempting,  cutting  off  a  long 
acute  angle ;  but  the  mountain  was  so  rough  and  the  brushwood 
so  scraggy  that  it  cost  us  quite  as  much  tir.iC  as  the  regular  road, 
and  double  the  labor,  besides  tear  and  wear  of  boots  and  other 
garments.  Lower  down,  the  path  is  very  beautiful ;  it  passes 
through  an  avenue  of  trees,  as  if  you  were  traversing  an  English 
park,  only  after  a  time  it  becomes  somewhat  close  and  monot- 
onous. "Glen  House,"  where  the  descent  terminates,  is  one  of 
the  most  celebrated  of  the  White  Mountain  hotels,  and  shows 
the  same*  kind  of  company  as  we  left  at  Fabyan's.  It  is  situ- 
ated in  a  finer  spot,  more  secluded  and  highland,  more  in  the 
very' heart  of  the  mountains.  For  those  wishing  to  spend  some 
time  in  the  district,  and  plunge  wholesale  into  its  characteristic 
enjoyments,  we  should  fancy  Glen  House  a  most  delightful  center. 

From  Glen  House  to  G]en  Station,  the  nearest  point  at  which 
yon  can  strike  the  railway,  is  a  distance  of  fifteen  miles.  Over 
thift  space  you  may  travel  either  by  the  stage-coach  or  by  pri- 


268  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

vate  conveyance.  We  chose  the  stage.  An  American  stage  is 
a  curious  combination  of  mediaevalism  and  the  latest  improve- 
ments. The  latest  improvements  consist  of  Saratoga  boxes — 
the  huge  wooden  trunks  in  which  American  ladies  carry  about 
their  very  valuable  and  varied  supply  of  dresses.  To  Accommo- 
date these  the  ^oach  is  made  large,  lumbering,  and  heavy.  In- 
side are  two  seats,  as  in  the  old  mail-coach,  but  as  they  are  at  a 
considerable  distance  from  each  other,  a  third  seat  may  be  intro- 
duced between,  having  the  effect  of  making  the  other  seats  close 
and  uncomfortable,  and  subjecting  the  whole  inmates  to  the  risk 
of  suffocation.  Outside  there  is  room  for  only  four  passengers. 
Six  strong  horses  are  needed  to  drag  the  ponderous  vehicle  up  hill 
and  down  dale.  The  roads  are  noffe  of  the  smoothest,  and  as  the 
coach  is  not  set  on  springs,  but  only  suspended  by  huge  leather 
belts,  the  jolting  is  absolutely  heart-breaking,  and  something 
like  sea-sickness  is  a  common  result.  These  great  six-horse 
vehicles  traverse  the  road  in  both  directions  several  times  a  day. 
Of  course  they  must  meet  sometimes.  If  we  had  been  the  driver 
our  mind  would  have  been  agitated  with  terrible  apprehensions 
as  to  the  kind  of  spot  where  the  meeting  might  take  place.  The 
road  is  precisely  of  the  width  necessary  for  a  single  coach.  Wlien 
two  meet  one  must  leave  the  road  and  take  refuge  in  the  brush- 
wood adjoining.  This  is  all  very  well  if  the  brushwood  happens 
to  be  on  the  same  level  as  the  road ;  but  if  the  road  is  a  foot  or 
two  higher  than  the  adjacent  wood,  or  along  the-  bank  of  a 
stream,  or  the  side  of  a  ditch,  or  the  edge  of  a  morass,  the  prob- 
lem is  not  so  simple.  To  a  stranger  it  seems  as  if  a  dead-lock 
were  inevitable.  We  fancy  the  coachmen  have  some  sort  of 
instinctive  apprehension  of  the  advent  of  another  coach,  and 
forewarned  is  forearmed.  But  when  a  private  conveyance 
approaches,  the  consequences  to  the  owner  may  be  somewhat 
serious.  If  there  is  no  room  to  pass  he  must  unyoke  his  horses, 
lift  round  his  buggy,  and  retreat  before  the  stage  till  a  passing- 
place  can  be  found.  It  is  wonderful  how  the  horses  seem  to 
^mderstand  these  difficulties,  and  how  much  common  sense  they 


«     A  NIGHT  ON  MOUNT   WASHINGTON,  269 

show  in  adapting  themselves  to  them,  and  taking  the  only  pos- 
sible way  to  get  out  of  them.  For  the  most  part  the  road  lies 
through  forest,  and  it  would  be  always  beautiful  if  it  were  not 
just  a  little  monotonous.  For  miles  upon  miles  no  human  habi- 
tation can  be  seen.  But  there  is  not  a  spot  that  is  not  worth 
looking  at,  and  now  and  again  you  get  glimpses  of  wooded  moun- 
tain and  winding  valley  on  which  the  eye  loves  to  linger,  knd 
which  photograph  themselves  on  the  memory. 

At  Glen  Station  you  may  get  into  the  railway  and  drive 
through  some  of  the  most  beautiful  scenery  of  the  White  Moun- 
tains, including  the  celebrated  Crawford  Notch,  returning  to  the 
Fabyan  House.  The  "  Notch"  is  a  valley,  some  twenty  miles  in 
length,  through  which  a  little  river,  the  Saco,  makes  its  way, 
while  the  mountains  rise  on  each  side,  from  the  very  edge  of  the 
stream  to  the  height  of  two  thousand  feet.  At  one  place  the 
opposite  rocks  come  within  twenty-two  feet  of  each  other.  The 
gorge  is  full  of  beauty,  and  here  and  there  small  mountain 
streams  tumbling  into  it  give  rise  to  beautiful  cascades;  but 
during  the  warm  tourist  season  these  unfortunately  are  generally 
empty.  The  railway  winds  through  the  Notch,  and  as  open 
cars  are  provided  on  this  part  of  the  line,  the  traveler  gets  an 
excellent  view,  if  he  can  contrive  to  keep  himself  from  being 
blinded  by  the  smoke  and  cinders  from  the  engine.  Of  the  very 
few  houses  that  meet  the  eye,  one  called  Willey  House  has  a 
tragical  interest.  More  than  fifty  years  ago  an  avalanche  of 
snow  descended  from  the  mountain,  burying  the  whole  Willey 
family,  nine  in  number,  who  had  fled  from  the  house  for  safety. 
If-  they  had  remained  they  would  have  avoided  their  dreadful 
fate;  a  rock  above  the  house  split  the  avalanche,  and  the  house 
escaped  and  is  there  to  this  day.  The  railway  brought  us  back 
to  Fabyan's,  exactly  twenty-four  hours  after  we  had  started. 
The  *•  round,"  as  they  call  it,  is  very  interesting,  and  gives  an 
excellent  idea  of  the  White  Mountains. 

No  one  would  ever  seriously  think  of  comparing  them  with 
Switzerland — they  have  no  snowy  summits,  hardly  even  a  peak, 


270  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

and  in  magnifcence  and  variety  are  never  to  be  talked  of  in  the 
same  breath.  It  would  be  more  suitable  to  compare  them  with 
the  mountains  of  Wales  or  of  Westmoreland.  We  may  be  under 
the  influence  of  national  prejudice,  but  we  cannot  award  tlie 
White  Mountains  a  place  of  equality  to  either.  There  is  no 
doubt  more  massiveness — more  unbroken  stretches  of  wooded 
mountain  and  grandly  sweeping  valley ;  but  there  is  much  less 
variety,  and  far  fewer  of  those  complete  little  landscapes  which 
a  painter  would  delight  to  copy.  They  seemed  to  us  a  mighty 
whole,  a  grand  tout  ensemble,  but  we  did  not  find  those  mani- 
fold nooks  of  exquisite  beauty  which  make  Wales  and  West- 
moreland a  perpetual  succession  of  delights,  each  with  some 
features  of  iis  own.  As  we  have  already  said,  there  is  a  want  of 
lake  and  river.  The  landscape  wants  eyes.  The  stretches  of 
unbroken  green  need  crags  and  peaks  to  break  them  up,  and 
sheets  and  threads  of  silver  to  give  them  brightness  and  life. 
We  believe,  however,  that  all  these  defects  would  have  disap- 
peared if  our  visit  had  been  paid  in  '*  the  fall."  From  what  we 
saw  elsewhere  of  the  exquisite  coloring  of  the  woods  at  that 
season,  we  believe  the  White  Mountains  must  be  perfectly  beau- 
tiful. And  probably  the  cascades  and  streams  are  fuller,  and 
the  whole  aspect  of  things  more  bright  and  lively. 

But  there  is  one  great  want  not  remedied  at  any  season — 
human  habitations.  For  the  solitudes  are  not  like  the  bare, 
unclothed  solitudes  of  the  Scottish  mountains,  grand  in  their 
very  loneliness:  they  are  wooded  glens  and  mountains  that 
seem  to  crave  habitations  to  nestle  in  their  leafy  shade.  But 
of  habitations,  apart  from  the  big  hotels,  too  big  to  be  pictur- 
esque, there  is  scarcely  a  vestige.  There  are  no  snug  hostelries 
at  the  roadside  to  invite  the  weary  pedestrian  to  rest.  There  is 
hardly  a  spot  over  the  whole  district,  except  the  hotels,  where 
one  can  get  even  a  cup  of  milk.  Strange  to  say,  in  democrat^ 
America,  the  White  Mountains  are  a  strict  preserve  for 
wealthy.  Not  by  any  edict  of  proprietors  threatening  trespa 
sers  with  prosecution,  but  by  the  law  of  the  hotels,  whose 


r^" 


BYIWN  IN  GREECE,  27 1 


practically  excludes  every  poor  man.  One  or  two  small  houses 
make  more  moderate  charges,  but  the  usual  rate  is  four  or  four 
and  a  half  dollars,  not  much  less  than  a  pound  a  day.  At  the 
Summit  Hotel,  on  Mount  Washington,  the  charge  for  tea,  bed, 
and  breakfast  is  four  dollars  and  a  half.  It  is  singular  how  ex- 
tremes meet.  The  poor  man  is  not  more  hopelessly  excluded 
from  the  precincts  of  an  aristocratic  deer  forest  in  the  old  coun- 
try than  he  is  from  the  open  beauties  of  the  White  Mountains 
in  democratic  New  England.  Of  course  he  may  carry  a  wallet 
and  sleep  in  the  open  air,  but  young  America  has  no  fancy  for 
such  ways.  In  many  respects,  as  they  say,  one  man  is  as  good 
as  another  in  America,  and,  as  the  Irishman  added,  a  little  bet- 
ter; but,  if  he  does  not  carry  a  good  fat  roll  of  dollars  in  his 
pocket,  the  White  Mountains  are  forbidden  fruit. 

Prof.  W.  G.  Blaikie,  in  Good  Words. 


BYRON   IN  GREECE. 

At  a  time  when  Greece  is  once  more  in  every  one's  thoughts 
and  on  nearly  every  one's  lips,  it  may  be  interesting  to  revert  to 
what  were  more  familiar  to  the  preceding  generation  of  English- 
men than  they  are  to  the  present  one — the  experiences  of  Byron 
in  Hellas,  whether  in  his  youth  as  a  traveler,  or  in  his  prime  and 
on  the  eve  of  his  death  as  a  martyr  to  the  cause  of  Greek  inde- 
pendence.    For  the  moment,  it  ist  as  a  political  claimant  that 
Greece  figures  in  the  public  eye.    We  need  hardly  say,  however, 
that  no  political  virus  will  find  their  expression  here,  and  that 
our  sole  task  is  to  reproduce  the  impressions  made  on  a  suscep- 
L    tible  and  lofty  mind  by  residence  among  a  famous  and  aspiring 
^    people  at  an  interesting  epoch  in  their  fortunes. 
I  *,  -Byron  was  in  his  twenty-second  year  when,  in  September, 
III  Jl^»  he  left  Malta  in  the  Spider,  a  brig  of  war,  and  after  eight 


272  1  HE   LIBRA  R  y  JA  /  GA  ZIXE. 

days'  sail  arrived  at  Prevesa.  Thence  he  made  an  inland  excur- 
sion of  some  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles,  to  Tepaleen,  where  he 
was  received  with  much  distinction  by  the  famous  Ali  Pasha, 
the  Governor  of  Albania,  Epirus,  and  part  of  Macedonia.  After 
a  nine  days'  journey  on  horseback,  he  reached  Tepaleen  at  five 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  as  the  sun  was  going  down.  He  has 
left  us  a  description,  both  in  prose  and  verse,  of  the  scene  that 
greeted  him.  In  the  former  he  designates  it  "  a  new  and  delight- 
ful spectacle  I  shall  never  forget."  In  verse,  his  more  natural 
language,  he  pictures  it  with  the  hand  of  a  master,  one  stanza 
of  which  is  worth  citing,  if  only  to  show,  in  these  days  of  exces- 
sive literary  artificiality,  what  an  effect  can  be  produced  by  the 
simplest  means — clear  seeing  and  unaffected  writing : 

The  wild  Albanian,  kirtled  to  his  knee, 

With  shawl-girt  head  and  ornamented  gun. 
And  gold-embroidered  garments,  fair  to  see ; 

The  crimson-scarfM  men  of  Macedon ; 
The  Delhi  with  his  cap  of  terror  on, 

And  crooked  glaive  ;  the  lively,  supple  Greek, 
And  swarthy  Nubia's  mutilated  son ; 

The  bearded  Turk  that  rarely  deigns  to  speak. 
Master  of  all  around,  too  potent  to  be  meek. 

Ali  Pasha  was  curious  to  know  why  a  man  so  young  should 
have  left  his  own  country ;  for  Turks  never  travel  except  to  con- 
quer, and  of  literary  conquests  Ali  Pasha  had  naturally  no  con- 
<ieption.  He  pleased  Byron  by  admiring  his  small  ears,  white 
hands,  and  curly  hair,  and  by  remarking  that  he  was  evidently 
a  man  of  birth — an  observation  the  young  poet  was  careful  to 
•repeat  to  his  mother,  and  to  set  down  in  his  journal.  Making 
his  way  back  to  the  coast,  he  touched  at  Patras,  and  passed  by 
Missolonghi,  little  conscious  that  in  fifteen  years  he  was  to  die 
there,  and  that  its  name  and  his  own  were  forever  to  be  associ- 
ated. "I  like  the  Albanians  much,"  he  wrote ;  "they  are  not 
all  Turks :  some  tribes  are  Christians.  But  their  religion  makes 
little  difference  in  their  manner  or  conduct."  This  last  obsecya- 


r 


BYRON  IN  GREECE,  273 

tion,  I  am  assured,  is  as  true  to-day  as  it  was  then.  "  They  are 
esteemed  the  best  troops  in  the  Turkish  service,"  he  goes  on  : 

I  lived  on  my  route  two  days  at  once,  and  three  days  again,  in  a  barrack,  and 
never  found  soldiers  so  tolerable,  though  I  have  been  in  the  garrisons  at  Gibraltar 
and  Malta,  and  seen  Spanish,  French,  Sicilian,  and  British  troops  in  abundance. 

About  the  middle  of  November  he  left  Prevesaand  journeyed 
through  Acarnania  and  ^Etolia  to  the  Morea,  having  a  body- 
guard of  some  forty  of  the  people  whom  he  thus  extols.  In  the 
Gulf  of  Arta  occurred  the  scene  he  has  described  so  graphically 
in  prose,  yet  prose  happily  never  degenerating  into  pseudo- 
lyricism.  I  feel  sure  the  reader  will  be  glad  to  look  upon  the 
glowing  picture,  even  though  it  be  not  new  to  him  : 

In  the  evening  the  gates  were  secured,  and  preparations  were  made  for  feeding 
our  Albanians.  A  goat  was  killed  and  roasted  whole,  and  four  fires  were  kindled  in 
the  yard,  round  which  the  soldiers  seated  themselves  jn  parties.  After  eating  and 
drinking,  the  greater  part  of  them  assembled  round  the  largest  of  the  fires,  and 
whilst  ourselves  and  the  elders  of  the  party  were  seated  on  the  ground,  danced 
round  the  blaze  to  their  own  songs  with  an  astonishing  enei^^.  All  their  sonffs 
were  narratives  of  some  robbing  exploit.  One  of  these,  which  detained  them  more 
than  an  hour,  bcpan  thus:  "When  we  set  out  from  Parga  there  were  sixty  of 
us.^    Then  came  the  burden  of  the  verse : 

Robbers  all  at  Parga ! 
obbers  all  at  Parga ! 

And  as  they  roared  out  this  stave  they  whirled  round  the  fire,  dropped  and  re- 
bounded from  their  knees,  and  again  whirled  round  as  the  chorus  was  again  re- 
peated. The  rippling  of  the  waves  upon  the  pebbly  margin  where  we  were  seated, 
filled  up  the  pauses  of  the  song  with  a  milder  and  not  more  monotonous  music.  The 
night  was  very  dark,  but  by  the  flashes  of  the  fires  we  caught  a  glimpse  of  the 
woods,  the  rocks,  and  the  lake,  which,  together  with  the  wild  appearance  of  the 
dancers,  presented  us  with  a  scene  that  would  have  made  a  fine  picture  in  the  hands 
of  such  an  artist  as  the  author  of  the  '*  Mysteries  of  UdoI|pho." 

Riding  toward  Delphi  along  the  sides  of  Parnassus,  he  saw 
a  flight  of  twelve  eagles.  He  seized  on  the  omen  and  hoped 
Apollo  would  accept  his  homage.  A  few  days  later  he  fired  at 
an  eagle  and  wounded  it.  He  tried  to  save  it — *'the  eye  was  so 
bright ;"  but  it  pined  and  died ;  and  he  never  attempted  the  life 
of  another  bird.     He  crossed  Mount  Cithaercn,  v^itcd  the  ruins 


274  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

of  Phyle.  and  reached  Athens  at  Christmas.  There  he  stayed 
nearly  three  months.  "Our  lodgings,"  wrote  Hobhouse,  his 
traveling  companion, 

consisted  of  a  sitting-room  and  two  bedrooms  opening  Into  a  courtyard,  where 
there  were  five  or  six  lemon  trees,  from  which,  during  our  residence  in  the  place^ 
was  plucked  the  fruit  that  seasoned  the  pilaf  and  other  national  dishes  served  up  at 
our  frugal  uble. 

The  eldest  daughter  of  the  house  was  the  "  Maid  of  Athens."  to 
whom  was  written  the  exquisite  little  lyric  the  whole  world 
knows  by  heart.  The  following  lines  are  perhaps  less  familiar 
to  most  people.  They  were  an  impromptu  by  Byron,  on  reading 
in  a  travelers'  book,  kept  by  the  ladies  of  the  house,  some  verses 
written  by  an  anonymous  traveler : 

♦ 
This  modest  baird;  like  many  a  bard  unknown. 
Rhymes  on  our  names,  but  wisely  hides  his  own. 
Yet  whoso *er  he  be.  to  say  no 'worse, 
His  name  would  bring  more  credit  than  his  verse. 

An  epigram  quite  in  the  style  of  the  "  English  Bards  and  Scotch 
Rev  ewers."  During  his  stay  in  Athens  he  made  several  excur- 
sions, bat  always  within  the  boundaries  of  Attica,  on  one  occa- 
sion being  nearly  carried  off  by  a  band  of  pirates  lying  hidden 
in  a  cave  near  Sunium.  All  this  time  he  was  writing  the  second 
canto  of  •*  Childe  Harold,"  which  was  begun  at  Janina  on  the 
31st  of  October,  1809.  and  finished  at  Smyrna  on  the  28th  of 
March  following.  He  had  left,  Athens  on  the  5th,  striking  on 
horseback  into  the  olive-wood  on  the  road  going  to  Salamis,  and 
galloping  at  a  quick, pace,  in  order  to  rid  himself  of  the  pain  of 
parting. 

He  has  left  but  little  in  prose  of  the  impression  his  first  visit 
to  Greece  made  upon  him,  the  reason  probably  being  that  there 
was  no  person  to  whom  he  could  pour  out  his  heart.  In  one  of 
his  letters  to  his  mother,  with  whom  his  sympathies  were  unifor- 
tunately,  but  not  unnaturally,  very  slight,  he  say^,  *•  I  have  no 
one  to  be  remembered  to  in  England,  and  wish  to  hearnothing 


r 


BYRON  IN  GREECE,  27$ 


from  it  but  that  you  are  well ;"  and  if  the  date  be  borne  in 
mind,  it  will  be  seen  that  this  was  not  the  cynicism  of  the  man, 
"but  the  loneliness  of  the  boy.  He  left  on  record  that  there  are 
places  in  Epirus  without  a  name,  and  rivers  laid  down  in  no 
map,  which  may  one  day,  when  more  known,  be  esteemed  supe- 
rior subjects  for  the  pencil  and  the  pen  than  *'  the  dry  ditch  of 
the  Ilissus  and  the  bogs  of  Boeotia."  Like  all  great  poets,  he 
immeasurably  preferred  the  rudest  Nature  to  the  most  finished 
Art.    Of  the  people  themselves  he  observed : 

1  see  not  much  difference  between  ourselves  and  the  Tuiics,  save  that  they  have 
long:  dresses  and  we  short,  and  that  we  talk  much  and  they  litUe.  They  are  sensible 
people.  ...  I  like  the  Greeks,  who  are  plausible  rascals — with  all  the  Turkish 
vices,  without  their  courage.  However,  some  are  brave,  and  all  are  beautiful,  very 
much  resembling  busts  of  Alcibiades :  the  womeif  not  quite  so  handsome. 

In  another  place  he  says  that  the  Greeks,  though  inferior  to 
the  Turks,  are  better  Jhan  the  Spaniards,  who  in  their  turn 
excel  the  Portuguese.  That  this  was  not  said  from  any  political 
prejudice,  is  evident  from  another  passage,  in  which  occurs  the 
following  prophecy:  "The  Greeks  will  sooner  or  later  rise 
against  the  Turks,  but  if  they  do  not  make  haste,  I  hope  Bona- 
parte will  come  and  drive  the  useless  rascals" — presumably  the 
Turks — "  away." 

Toward  the  end  of  July  he  was  back  at  Athens,  having  in  the 
interim  been  to  Constantinople.  He  lodged  in  a  Franciscan 
convent,  making  Athens  his  headquarters  till  the  following 
satnmer,  though  continually  breaking  his  residence  by  excur- 
sions in  the  Morea.  In  the  course  of  his  wanderings  he  crossed 
the  Isthmus  of  Corinth  eight  times ;  he  could  say  without  boast- 
ing. "  The  greater  part  of  Greece  is  already  my  own,  so  that  I 
shall  only  go  over  my  old  ground,  and  look  upon  my  old  seas 
and  moutitains,  the  only  acquaintances  I  ever  found  improve 
Upon  me."  He  was  back  in  England  in  July,  1811.  bringing  with 
him  some  marbles,  four  ancient  Athenian  skulls  afterward  given 
to  Walter  Scott,  a  phial  of  Attic  hemlock,  four  live  tortoises,  a 
greyhound,  and  two  Greek  servants. 


2^(>  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Twelve  years,  as  we  have  said,  were  to  elapse  before  Byron 
again  visited  Greece.  But  what  twelve  years !  He  had  mean- 
while filled  the  world  with  his  fame.  From  being  the  lonely  and 
friendless  youth  who  had  written  some  fugitive  poems  that  had 
been  laughed  at,  and  had  retaliated  with  a  satire  whose  ability 
every  one  had  acknowledged,  but  whose  existence  he  was  him- 
self anxious  to  forget,  he  had  expanded  into  a  man  whose  works 
were  in  everybody's  hands  and  whose  deeds  awakened  universal 
curiosity.  In  those  twelve  years  he  had  written  "  Childe  Har- 
old," the  "  Bride  of  Abydos,"  the  "  Corsair,"  "  Manfred,"  **  Cain," 
"  Don  Juan,"  and  a  crowd  of  other  poems  and  dramas  of  which 
these  are  but  the  loftiest  types.  He  had  contracted  an  unfortu- 
nate marriage,  had  turned  his  back  upon  his  country,  and  had 
identified  himself  with  the  sorrows  and  hopes  of  Italy,  where  he 
had  found  as  much  consolation  as  was  possible  to  a  nature  that 
found  contentment  neither  in  society  nor  in  solitude,  neither  in 
obscurity  nor  in  renown,  neither  in  action  nor  repose. 

And  now  once  more  he  turned  to  the  land,  in  singinor  of 
whose  decayed  state  and  shattered  fortunes  he  had  won  his  ear- 
liest bays.  Writing  to  Mr.  Blaquiere  on  the  5th  of  April,  1823, 
he  said : 

I  cannot  express  to  you  how  much  I  feel  interested  in  the  Greek  cause,  and 
nothinfif  but  the  hopes  I  entertained  of  witnessing  the  liberation  of  Italy  itself  pre- 
vented me  long  ago  from  returning  to  do  what  litUe  I  could  as' an  individual  in  the 
land  which  it  is  an  honor  even  to  have  visited. 

Mr.  Blaquiere,  who  was  proceeding  on  a  special  mission  to 
Greece,  on  the  part  of  the  London  Committee  of  Emancipation, 
was  instructed  by  them  to  touch  at  Genoa  on  purpose  to  confer 
with  Byron,  and  the  result  was  a  letter  from  the  latter  to  the 
Committee,,  written  on  the  12th  of  May,  much  too  long  to 
transcribe,  but  containing  the  most  valuable  information  and 
couched  in  the  most  practical  and  business-like  terms  imagin- 
able. It  ended  with  the  assurance  that  the  Committee  might 
command  him  "in  any  and  everyway;"  and  the  Writer  added, 
"  If  I  am  favored  with  any  instructions  I  shall  endeavor  to  obey 


I 


BYROX  nv   GREECE.  2'j7 

them  to  the  letter,  whether  conformable  to  my  own  opinion  or 
not." 

Before  the  end  of  the  month  it  was  decided  that  Byron  should 
betake  himself  to  Greece,  "the  only  place,"  he  wrote  to  Tre- 
lawney,  **  I  was  ever  contented  in.  They  all  say  I  can  be  of  use 
to  Greece,  I  do  not  know  ho»v — nor  do  they;  but  at  all  events 
let  us  go."  That  he  did  not  go  from  a  mere  impulse  of  self- 
indulgence  and  from  a  craving  for  excitement  is  quite  certain. 
He  did  not  see  his  way  clearly  to  rendering  that  practical  service 
to  the  Greeks  which  alone  was  worthy  of  consideration,  and  he 
had  a  personal  presentiment,  which  he  expressed  to  Lady  Bless- 
ington  and  Count  D'Orsay,  that  he  should  never  return  from 
the  expedition.  Lady  Biessington  recounts  that  after  giving 
vent  to  this  feeling  he  leaned  his  head  upon  the  arm  of  the  sofa 
and  burst  into  tears,  which  he  vainly  strove  to  explain  away  by 
attributing  them  to  hysterical  nervousness.  Madame  Guiccioli, 
too,  with  whom  the  present  writer  had  some  acquaintance  dur- 
ing the  closing  years  of  her  life,  always  narrated  that  for  some 
weeks  beforfe  his  departure  his  mind  was  evidently  the  theater 
of  a  painful  and  protracted  struggle. 

He  slept  on  board  the  Hercules  on  the  night  of  the  13th  of 
July,  off  Genoa,  and  the  next  day  was  supposed  to  be  on  his 
way.  But  at  first  there  was  little  wind,  and  when  it  rose  it 
waxed  to  a  furious  storm,  and  the  party  were  driven  back  into 
port.  Byron  remarked  it  was  a  bad  omen,  and  others  observed, 
though  he  did  not,  that  the  start  had  been  made  on  a  Friday, 
which  in  a  queer  sort  of  way,  in  common  with  many  other  peo- 
ple, he  usually  regarded  as  an  inauspicious  day.  The  only  con- 
solation for  the  mishap  was  the  discovery  that  some  verses  had 
arrived  for  the  illustrious  adventurer  from  Goethe,  who  after- 
ward, referring  to  the  incident,  left  it  on  record  that  "there 
cannot  be  any  doubt  that  a  nation  which  can  boast  of  so  many 
great  names,  will  class  Byron  among  the  first  of  those  through 
whom  she  has  acquired  such  glory."  Byron  had  only  time  just 
to  write  a  graceful  letter  of  acknowledgment,  before  he  was 


278  THE   LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

again  on  the  waters.  He  left  Leghorn  on  the  24th  of  July,  and 
ten-  days  later  cast  anchor  at  Argostoli,  the  chief  port  of  Cepha- 
lonia.  He  brought  with  him  about  ;£9,ooo,  a  portion  of  which 
sum  he  had  at  the  time  in  hand,  some  of  which  he  had  raised 
on  bills  of  exchange,  while  some  had  been  procured  by  the  sale 
of  his  furniture  and  books.  As  for  the  future,  his  intentions 
were  thus  expressed  in  a  letter  written  on  the  eve  of  departure 
from  Italy: 

If  I  remain  in  Greece,  \rhich  will  mainly  depend  upon  the  presumed  probable 
utility  of  my  presence  there,  and  of  the  opinions  of  the  Greeks  themselves  as  to  its 
propriety— in  short,  if  I  am  welcome  to  them— I  shall  continue,  during  my  residence 
at  least,  to  apply  such  portions  of  my  income,  present  and  future,  as  may  forward 
the  object ;  that  is  to  say,  what  I  can  spare  for  the  purpose.  Privation  I  can,  or  at 
least  could  once,  bear ;  abstinence  I  am  accustomed  to ;  and  as  to  fatigue,  I  was 
once  a  tolerable  traveler.  What  I  may  be  now  I  cannot  tell,  but  I  will  try.  I  await 
the  commands  of  the  Committee.  It  would  have  given  me  pleasure  to  have  had 
.some  more  defined  instructions  before  I  went ;  but  these,  of  course,  rest  at  the 
option  of  the  Committee. 

There  is  a  modesty  of  tone,  a  subordination  of  self,  in  these 
passages,  which  is  very  pleasing,  and  whiph  serves  to  indicate 
better  than  any  other  second  description  the  frame  of  mind  in 
which  the  great  poet  entered  upon  his  solemn  and  heroic  mis- 
sion. 

He  soon  found  that  he  had  a  difficult  part  to  play,  for  there 
were  two  parties  in  Greece;  one  nominally  having  the  direction 
of  the  movement  for  independence,  the  other  seeking  to  wrench 
from  them  their  authority.  Byron  soon  made  up  his  mind  that 
he  must  have  nothing  to  do  with  these  rivalries,  unless  it  were 
to  reconcile  them.  The  National  Government  was  necessarily 
only  ostensible;  there  were  a  number  of  military  chiefs,  each 
sighing  for  supreme  command,  and  each  trying  to  intercept  as 
much  of  the  revenue  collected  for  patriotic  purposes  as  possible ; 
tliere  was  a  fleet  furnished  by  private  adventure,  and  an  army 
counting  more  on  plunder  than  on  pay.  Perceiving  the  state  of 
affairs,  and  resolved  not  to  be  compromised  by  it,  he  lingered  in 
Cephalorua  in  considerable  discomfort,  collecting  as  best  he 


r 


-      BYRON  IN  GREECE.  279 

could  the  requisite  information  for  his  guidance.  The  brave 
Marco  Botzaris,  who  soon  afterward  fell  in  action,  besought 
Byron  to  join  him  in  his  campaign  in  the  mountains.  Metaxa, 
the  Governor  of  Missolonghi,  urged  him  to  repair  to  its  rescue, 
for  the  Turks  were  directing  against  it  a  blockade  both  by  land 
and  sea.  Colcotroni  sent  urgent  messages  inviting  him  to  a 
congress  to  be  shortly  held  at  Salamis ;  while  Mavrocordato  was 
imploring  him  to  travel  in  all  haste  to  Hydra.  "  It  is  easier  to 
conceive  than  to  relate."  says  Count  Gamba,  "  the  various  means 
employed  to  engage  him  in  one  faction  or  the  other :  letters, 
messages,  intrigues,  and  recriminations,  nay,  each  faction  had  its 
agent  exerting  every  art  to  degrade  its  opponent." 

His  letters  to  Madame  Guiccioli  were  frequent.  In  one  of 
them,  after  expressing  a  doubt  whether  he  or  any  foreigner 
could  be  of  use  to  the  Greeks,  he  added : 

Pray  be  as  cheerful  and  tranquil  as  you  can,  and  be  assured  that  there  is  nothing 
here  that  can  excite  anything  but  a  wish  to  be  with  you  again,  though  we  are  very 
kindly  treated  by  the  English  of  all  descriptions.  Of  the  Gredcs  I  can't  say  much 
Rood  hitherto,  and  I  do  not  like  to  speak  ill  of  them  though  they  do  of  each  other. 

His  letters  to  the  General  Government  of  Greece  at  the  time 
were  models  of  dignified  frankness  and  good  sense.  Again  and 
again  he  repeated  that  the  Greeks  had  no  enemy  to  fear  except 
their  own  tendency  to  discord.  The  Turks  had  retreated  from 
Acamania;  Corinth  had  been  captured,  and  Missolonghi  had 
been  relieved ;  and  to  the  latter  place,  before  the  end  of  the 
year,  the  poet  repaired  to  meet  and  confer  with  Mavrocordato. 
"  I  need  not  tell  you,"  wrote  the  latter,  "  how  much  I  long  for 
your  arrival,  to  what  a  pitch  your  presence  is  desired  by  every- 
body, or  what  a  prosperous  direction  it  will  give  to  our  affairs. 
Your  counsels  will  be  listened  to  like  oracles." 

A  good  deal  of  this  anxiety,  no  doubt,  was  caused  by  the 
eagerness,  the  pardonable  eagerness,  to  get  hold  of  the  money 
Byron  had  resolved  to  embark  in  the  Greek  cause.  While  mak- 
ing for  Missolonghi  he  and  his  party  narrowly  escaped  capture 
by  a  Turkish  frigate.    They  had  to  conceal  themselves  among 


280  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

some  rocks  off  Dragomestri.  Count  Gamba  and  all  the  more 
valuable  articles  of  the  expedition  were  not  so  fortunate,  and 
were  towed  by  the  Turkish  frigate  into  Patras.  He  had  the 
skill  to  concoct  a  plausible  account  of  himself,  and  was  accord- 
ingly released. 

Once  in  the  midst  of  the  Greeks,  Byron  never  vacillated  in  his 
determination  to  throw  in  his  lot  with  tiiem.  He  was  angry 
with  them,  disgusted  with  them,  disappointed  by  them  over  and 
over  again ;  but,  as  he  said,  "  others  may  do  as  they  please ;  they 
may  go,  but  I  stay  here — that  is  certain."  In  a  fit  oif  extreme 
irritation  at  one  of  their  exhibitions  of  incapacity  and  indiffer- 
ence, he  declared  they  were  such  barbarians  he  would  pave  the 
roads  with  them  if  he  were  their  master.  Yet  in  quieter  mo- 
ments he  made  every  allowance  for  the  effect  of  centuries  of 
oppression  ;  and  Colonel  Napier  has  recorded  the  opinion  that, 
with  the  exception  of  Mr.  Gordon,  Byron  was  the  only  man  that 
seemed  justly  to  estimate  their  character.  It  was  an  infinite 
relief  to  him  at  last  to  be  promised  a  chance  of  action ;  and  in 
the  middle  of  January  he  found  himself  appointed  commander 
of  an  expedition  to  be  directed  against  Lepanto.  His  little  army 
was  to  consist  of  a  force  of  Suliotes,  who  turned  out  to  be  the 
most  unmanageable  rascals  ever  got  together.  Nearly  half  of 
them  insisted  on  having  the  rank  of  officers.  Byron  at  once 
discharged  the  whole  lot.  This  brought  them  to  their  senses, 
but  they  soon  again  mutinied,  and  both  Colonel  Stanhope  and 
Count  Gamba  have  given  striking  accounts  of  the  scene  that 
ensued.  Each  is  too  long  for  quotation.  Byron  was  suffering 
from  an  attack  of  convulsions,  the  first  symptom  of  what  was  to 
follow.  The  Suliotes  broke  into  his  aparment  and  brandished 
their  costly  arms.  **  Byron,"  says  Colonel  Stanhope,  "  electrified' 
by  this  unexpected  act,  seemed  to  recover  from  his  sickness ;  and 
the  more  the  Suliotes  raged,  the  more  his  calm  courage  tri- 
umphed. The  scene  was  truly  sublime."  Finally  they  had  to 
be  got  rid  of,  and  the  expedition,  to  Byron's  infinite  chagrin, 
was  abandoned. 


BYRON  IN  GREECE.  ,  28 1 

Among  his  other  vexations  was  the  desire  of  some  of  his  asso- 
ciates to  promote  the  cause  of  Greece  by  a  free  use  of  the 
printing-press.  He  at  once  discerned  the  danger  of  allowing 
people  who  could  not  agree,  to  publish  their  grievances  to  the 
world ;  and  he,  who  had  been  all  his  life  battling  for  freedom  of 
speech  and  utterance  in  every  form,  saw  himself  regarded  as  a 
reactionary  because  he  insisted  on  keeping  the  main  end  in 
view,  and  shaping  the  means  in  conformity  with  it.  But  he 
stuck  to  his  point,  and  as,  to  use  his  own  words,  he  was  main- 
taining nearly  the  whole  machine  at  his  own  cost,  he  carried  it. 
His  firmness  caused  him  to  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  mediator 
among  all  the  rival  chiefs,  who  on  one  occasion  offered,  through 
Colcotroni,  to  submit  their  differences  to  him.  Incidents  of  this 
character  encouraged  him  in  spite  of  his  failing  health  and  the 
manifest  insufficiency  of  military  resources.  *'  It  were  better," 
he  wrote,  "to  die  doing  something  than  nothing.  My  presence 
here  has  been  supposed  so  far  useful  as  to  have  prevented  con- 
fusion from  becoming  worse  confounded."  No  offers,  however 
flattering,  made  him  deviate  from  his  purpose  of  attending  to 
the  practical  everyday  wants  of  the  government  and  the  army. 
When  it  was  suggested  that  he  should  be  made  governor-general 
of  that  part  of  Greece  which  was  already  free  from  the  presence 
of  the  Turks,  he  troubled  himself  far  less  about  so  vague  a  pro- 
posal than  concerning  the  condition  of  the  fortifications  of  Mis- 
solpnghi,  the  state  of  discipline  among  the  patriotic  levies,  the 
strictest  observance  of  international  law,  so  as  not  to  predispose 
any  of  the  powers  against  Greece,  and,  finally,  about  the  proper 
method  for  launching  a  large  loan. 

As  far  as  he  cherished  any  personal  wish  in  connection  with 
the  enterprise,  it  was  that  he  should  have  an  opportunity  of  dis- 
tinguishing himself  in  some  brilliant  military  exploit,  for  he  had 
rhat  Virgil  terms  an  "  immense  yearning  for  fame,"  and  it  is 
pretty  certain  that  he  would  have  been  well  content  to  find  in 
some  such  adventure  a  glorious  death.  The  lines  he  had  written 
on  the  22d  of  January  previously,  his  thirty-sixth  birthday,  the 


282  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

only  lines  he  wrote  during  this  second  visit  to  Greece,  and  the 
last  that  ever  proceeded  from  his  pen,  were  no  mere  heroics  of 
the  Muse.    They  betrayed  his  innermost  thought : 

The  sword,  the  banner,  and  the  field. 
Glory  and  Greece,  around  we  see ! 
The  Spartan  borne  upon  his  shield 
Was  i)ot  more  free. 

Tread  those  reviving  passions  down. 

Unworthy  manhood !    Unto  thee 
Indifferent  should  the  smile  or  frown 
Of  beauty  be. 

If  thou  regret'st  thy  youth,  why  live  ? 

The  land  of  bororable  death 
Is  here.    Up  to  the  field,  and  give 
Away  thy  breath ! 

Seek  out,  less  often  sought  than  found, 

A  soldier's  grave,  for  thee  the  best ; 
Then  look  around,  and  choose >thy  ground. 
And  take  thy  rest ! 

But  it  was  not  to  be.  Had  Heaven  granted  his  prayer  it 
would  have  shown  itself  too  partial  to  one  upon  whom  it  had 
already  lavished  an  exceptional  number  of  its  favors.  Nor,  to 
be  just,  and  though  Byron '  has  been  roughly  handled  and  even 
unfairly  aspersed  by  austere  moralists,  did  he  deserve  the  glori- 
ous end  he  begged  for.  Great  as  was  his  genius,  and  splendid 
on  the  whole  as  was  the  use  he  made  of  it,  his  life  had  not  been 
uniformly  noble  enough  to  close  with  the  honors  of  a  patriot's 
and  martyr's  death  on  the  battlefield.  But  if  that  first  place  of 
honor  was  denied  him,  at  least  proxime  accessit.  Though  repos- 
ing with  his  head  upon  his  pillow,  he  died  for  Greece,  which  to 
this  hour  finds  in  the  recollections  of  his  name,  his  Muse,  and 
his  sword,  one  of  the  strongest  claims  to  the  sympathies  of 
mankind. 

Temple  Bar. 


CARL  YLE  'S  LECTURES,  283 


CARLYLE'S  LECTURES  ON  THE  PERIODS  OF 
EUROPEAN  CULTURE, 
From  Homer  to  Goethe. 

"  Detestable  mixture  of  prophecy  and  playacforism " — 
so  in  his  "  Reminiscences  "  Carlyle  describes"  his  work  as  a 
lecturer.  Yet  we  are  assured  by  a  keen,  if  friendly,  critic, 
Harriet  Martineau,  that  "  the  merits  of  his  discourses  were 
so  great  that  he  might  probably  have  gone  on  year  after  year 
till  this  time  with  improving  success  and  perhaps  ease,  but 
the  struggle  was  too  severe,"  i.  e.,  the  struggle  w4th  nervous 
excitement  and  ill-health.  In  a  friendly  notice  of  the  first 
lecture  ever  delivered  (May  i,  1837)*  by  Carlyle  before  a  Lon- 
don audience,  the  Times  observes :  "  The  lecturer,  who  seems 
new  to  the  mere  technicalities  of  public  speaking,  exhibited 
proofs  before  he  had  done  of  many  of  its  higher  and  nobler 
attributes,  gathering  self-possession  as  he  proceeded." 

In  the  following  year  a  course  of  twelve  lectures  was  de- 
livered "On  the  History  of  Literature,  or  the  Successive 
Periods  of  European  Culture,"  from  Homer  to  Goethe.  As  far 
as  I  can  ascertain,  except  from  short  sketches  of  the  two  lec- 
tures of  each  week  in  the  Examiner,  from  May  6,  1838,  on- 
wards, it  is  now  impossible  to  obtain  an  account  of  this 
series  of  discourses.  The  writer  in  the  Examiner  (perhaps 
Leigh  Hunt)  in  noticing  the  first  two  lectures  (on  Greek  liter- 
ature) writes :  "  He  again  extemporizes,  he  does  not  read. 
We  doubted  on  hearing  the  Monday's  lecture  whether  he 
would  ever  attain  in  this  way  to  the  fluency  as  well  as  depth 
for  which  he  ranks  among  celebrated  talkers  in  private ;  but 
Friday's  discourse  re^lieved  us.  He  'strode  away'  like 
Ulysses  himself,  and  had  only  to  regret,  in  common  with  his 

♦  %B  ist  of  May  was  illustrious.  On  the  evening  of  that  day  Browning's  "  Straf- 
ford" was  produced  by  Macready  at  Covent  Garden  theater.  Dr.  Chalmers  was  at 
this  time  also  lecturing  in  London,  and  extensive  reports  of  his  lectures  are  given  in 
tb«  Times  and  the  Morning  Chronicle.  ^ 


284  "  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE. 

audience,  the  limits  to  which  the  one  hour  confined  him." 
George  Ticknor  was  present  at  the  ninth  lecture  of  this 
course,  and  he  noted  in  his  diary  (June  i,  1838):  "He  is  a 
small,  spare,  ugly  Scotchman,  with  a  strong  accent,  which  I 
should  think  he  takes  no  pains  to  mitigate.  .  .  .  To-day  he 
spoke — as  I  think  he  commonly  does — without  notes,  and 
therefore  as  nerarly  extempore  as  a  man  can  who  prepares 
himself  carefully,  as  was  plain  he  had  done.  He  was  impress- 
ive, I  think,  though  such  lecturing  could  not  well  be  very 
popular ;  and  in  some  parts,  if^  he  was  not  poetical,  he  was 
picturesque."  Tichnor  estimates  the  audience  at  about  pne 
hundred. 

A  manuscript  of  over  two  hundred  and  fifty  pages  is  in  ray 
hands,  which  I  take  to  be  a  transcript  from  a  report  of  these 
lectures  by  some  skillful  writer  of  shorthand.  It  gives  very 
fully,  and  I  think  faithfully,  eleven  lectures ;  one,  the  ninth, 
is  wanting.  In  the  following  pages,  I  may  say,  nothing,  or 
very  little,  is  my  own.  I  have  transcribed  several  of  the  most 
striking  passages  of  the  lectures,  and  given  a  view  of  the 
whole,  preserving  continuity  by  abstracts  of  those  portions 
which  I  do  not  transcribe.  In  these  abstracts  I  have,  as  far 
as  possible,  used  the  words  of  the  manuscripts.  In  a  few 
instances  I  have  found  it  convenient  to  bring  together  para- 
graphs on  the  same  subject  from  different  lectures.  Some 
passages  which  say  what  Carlyle  has  said  elsewhere  I  give  for 
the  sake  of  the  manner,  more  direct  than  that  of  the  printed 
page ;  sometimes  becoming  even  colloquial.  The  reader  will  do 
well  to  imagine  these  passages  delivered  with  that  Northern 
accent  which  Carlyle's  refined  Bostonian  hearer  thought  "he 
took  no  pains  to  mitigate." 

At  the  outset  Carlyle  disclaims  any  intention  to  construct 
a  scientific  theory  of  the  history  of  culture;  some  plan  is 
necessary  in  order  to  approach  the  subject  and  become  more 
familiar  with  it,  but  any  proposed  theory  must  be  viewed  as 
one  of  mere  convenieticc. 


n 


CARL  YLE^  'S  LECTURES,  285 

Ttere  is  only  one  theory  which  has  been  most  triumphant — that  of  the  planets.  On 
so  other  subject  has  any  theory  succeeded  so  far  yet.  Even  that  is  not  perfect ;  the 
Btronomer  knows  one  or  two  planets,  we  may  say,  blit  he  does  not  know  what  they  are, 
where  tbcy  are  going,  or  whether  the  solar  system  is  not  itself  drawn  into  a  larger  sys- 
tem of  the  kind.  In  short,  with  every  theory  the  man  who  knows  something  about  it, 
knows  mainly  this — that  there  is  much  uncertainty  in  it,  great  darkness  about  it,  extend- 
ing down  to  an  infinite  deep  ;  in  a  word,  that  he  does  not  know  what  it  is.  Let  him 
take  a  stone,  for  example,  the  pebble  that  is  under  his  feet ;  he  knows  that  it  is  a  stone 
broken  out  of  rocks  old  a.s  the  creation,  but  what  that  pebble  is  he  knows  not ;  he 
knows  nothing  at  all  about  that.  This  system  of  making  a  theory  about  everything  is 
what  we  may  call  an  enchanted  state  of  mind.  That  man  should  be  misled,  that  he 
should  be  deprived  of'knowing  the  truth  that  the  world  is  a  reality  and  not  a  huge  con- 
fused hypothesis,  that  he  should  be  deprived  of  this  by  the  very  faculties  given  him  to 
tmderstand  it,  I  can  call  by  no  other  name  than  enchantment. 

Yet  when  we  look  into  the  scheme  of  these  lectures  we 
perceive  a  presiding  thought,  which  certainly  had  more  than 
a  provisional  value  for  Carlyle.  The  history  of  culture  is 
viewed  as  a  succession  of  faiths,  interrupted  by  periods  of 
skepticism.  The  faith  of  Greece  and  Rome  is  succeeded  by 
the  Christian  faith,  with  an  interval  of  pagan  skepticism,  of 
which  Seneca  may  be  taken  as  a  representative.  The  Chris- 
tian faith,  earnestly  held  to  men's  hearts  during  a  great  epoch, 
is  transforming  itself  into  a  new  thing,  not  yet  capable  of 
definition,  proper  to  our  nineteenth  century;  of  this  new 
thing  the  Goethe  of  "Wilhelm  Meister"  and  the  **West- 
ostlicher  Divan  "  is  the  herald.  But  its  advent  w^s  preceded 
by  that  melancholy  interval  of  Christian  skepticism,  the 
eighteenth  century,  which  is  represented  by  Voltaire  and  the 
sentimental  Goethe  of  "  Werther,"  which  reached  its  terrible 
consummation  in  the  French  Revolution ;  and  against  which 
stood  iut  in  forlorn  heroism  Samuel  Johnson.  Carlyle's  gen- 
eral view  is  a  broad  one,  which  disregards  all  but  fundamen- 
tal differences  in  human  beliefs.  The  paganism  of  Greece  is 
not  severed  from  that  of  Rome ;  Christianity,  Catholic  and 
Protestant,  is  essentially  of  one  and  the  same  epoch. 

There  is  a  sentence  which  I  find  in  Goethe  full  of  meaning  in  this  regard.  It  must 
he  noted,  he  says,  that  belief  and  unbelief  are  two  opposite  principles  in  human  nature. 
The  theme  of  all  human  history,  so  far  as  we  are  able  to  perceive  it,  is  the  contest 
between  these  two  principles.  All  periods,  he  goes  on  to  say,  in  which  belief  predomi- 
nates, in  which  it  is  the  main  element,  the  inspiring  principle  of  action,  are  distin- 
guished by  great,  soul-stirring,  fertile  events,  and  worthy  of  perpetual  remembrance : 


286  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and,  6n  the  other  hand,  when  unbelief  gets  the  upper  hand,  that  age  !&  unfertile, 
unproductive,  and  intrinsically  mean  ;  in  which  there  is  no  pabulum  for  the  spirit  of 
ihan;  and  no  one  can  get  nourishment  for  himself.  This  passagb  is  one  of  the  most 
pregnaiit  utterances  ever  delivered,  and  we  shall  do  well  to  keep  it  in  mind  in  these  dis- 
quisitions. 

In  attempting  "to  follow  the  stream  of  mind  from  the 
period  at  which  the  first  great  spirits  of  our  Western  World 
wrote  and  flourished  down  to  these  times,"  we  start  from 
Greece.  When  we  ask  who  were  the  first  inhabitants  of 
Greece,  we  can  derive  no  clear  account  from  any  source. 
"  We  have  no  good  history  of  Greece.  This  is  not  at  all 
remarkable.  Greek  transactions  never  had  anything  alive 
[for  us.^];  no  result  for  lis;  they  were  dead  entirely.  The 
only  points  which  serve  to  guide  us  are  a  few  ruined  towns,  a 
few  masses  of  stone,  and  some  broken,  statuary."  Three 
epochs,  however,  in  Greek  history,  can  be  traced :  the  first, 
that  of  the  siege  of  Troy — ^the  first  confederate  act  of  the 
Hellenes  in  their  capacity  of  a  European  people ;  the  second, 
that  of  the  Persian  invasion ;  the  third,  the  flower-time  of 
Greece,  the  period  of  Alexander  the  Great,  when  Greece 
"  exploded  itself  on  Asia." 

Europe  was  henceforth  to  develop  herself  on  an  independent  footing,  and  it  has  faeoi 
so  ordered  that  Greece  was  to  begin  that.  As  to  their  peculiar  physiognomy  among 
nations,  they  were  in  one  respect  an  extremely  interesting  people,  but  in  another  un- 
amiable  and  weak  entirely.  It  has  been  somewhere  remarked  l)y  persons  learned  in  the 
speculation  on  what  is  called  the  doctrine  of  races,  ths^  the  Pelasagi  were  of  Celtic 
descent.  However  this  may  be,  jt  is  certain  that  there  is  a  remarkable  similarity  in 
character  of  the  French' to  these  Greeks.  Their  first  feature  was  what  we  may  call  the 
central  feature  of  all  others,  exhausting  (?)*  veheituncey  not  exactly  strength^  for 
there  was  no  permanent  coherence  in  it  as  in  strength,  but  a  sort  of  fiery  im^tuosity  ; 
a  vehemence  never  anywhere  so  remarkable  as  among  the  Greeks,  except  among  the 
French,  and  there  are  instances  of  this,  both  in  its  good  and  bad  point  of  view.  As  to 
the  bad,  there  is  the  instance  mentioned  by  Thucydides  of  the  sedition  in  Corcyra, 
which  really  does  read  like  a  chapter  out  of  the  French  Revolution,  in  which  the  actors 
seem  to  be  quite  regardless  of  any  moment  but  that  which  was  at  hand. 

The  story  of  the  massacre  is  briefly  told,  which  recalls  to 
Carlyle,  as  it  did  to  Niebuhr,  the  events  of  September,  1792. 

But  connected  with  idl  this  savageness  there  was  an  extraordinary  delicacy  of  taste 
and  genius  in  them.  They  had  a  prompt  dexterity  in  seizing  the  true  relatiooB  ti 
pbjects,  a  beautiful  and  quick  sense  in  perceiving  the  places  in  which  the  things  lay, 
all  round  the  world,  which  they  had  to  work  with,  and  this,  without  being  entiidy 

^  j^^g  ,,  existing.'*-  " 


CAJRL  YLE'S  LECTURES,  2^7 

^dinirable,  was  in  their  own  internal  province  )iighly  useful.  So  the  French,  with 
tkeir  undeniable  barrenness  of  genius,  have  yet  in  a  remarkable  manner  the  facility  of 
9xpits»ni:  themselves  with  precision  and  elegance,  to  so  singular  a  degree,  that  no  ideas 
or  inventions  can  possibly,  become  popularized  till  they  are  presented  to  the  world  by 
means  of  the  French  language.  .  .  .  But  in  poetry,  philosophy,  and  all  things  the 
Greek  genius  displays  itself  with  as  curious  a  felicity  as  the  French  does  in  frivolous 
exercises.  Singing  or  music  was  the  central  principle  of  the  Greeks,  not  a  subordinate 
one.  And  they  were  right.  What  is  not  musical  is  rough  and  hard  and  cannot  be  har- 
monized. Harmony  is  the  essence  of  Art  and  Science.  The  mind  molds  to  itself  the 
clay,  and  makes  it  what  it  will. 

This  spirit  of  harmony  is  seen  even  in  the  earliest  Pelasgic 
architecture,  and  more  admirably  in  Greek  poetry,  Greek 
temples,  Greek  statuary.  A  beautiful  example  may  be  found 
in  the  story  of  how  Phidias  achieved  his  masterpiece  at  Elis. 

When  he  projected  his  Jupiter  of  Elis,  his  ideas  wer^  so  confused  and  bewildered  as 
to  give  him  great  unrest,  and  he  wandered ~about  perplexed  that  the  shape  he  wished 
would  not  disclose  itself.  But  one  night,  after  struggling  in  pain  with  his  thoughts  as 
usual,  and  meditating  on  his  design,  in  a  dream  he  saw  a  group  of  Grecian  maidens 
approach,  with  pails  of  water  on  their  heads,  who  began  a  song  in  praise  of  Jupiter. 
At  that  moment  the  Sun  of  Poetry  stared  upon  him,  and  set  free  the  image  which  he 
sought  for,  and  it  crystallized,  as  it  were,  out  of  his  mind  into  marble,  and  became  as 
symmetry  itself.  This  spirit  of  harmony  operated  directly  in  him,  informing  all  parts 
of  his  mind,  thence  tiansferriog  itself  into  statuary,  seen  with  the  eye,  and  filling  the 
heart  of  all  people. 

Having  discussed  the  origin  of  Polytheism,  Carlyle  speaks 
of  divination. 

It  is  really,  in  my  opinion,  a  blasphemy  against  human  nature  to  attribute  the  whole 
of  the  system  [of  polytheism]  to  quackery  and  falsehood.  Divination,  for  instance, 
was  the  great  nucleus  round  which  polytheism  formed  itself — the  constituted  core  of 
the  whole  matter.  All  people,  private  men  as  well  as  states,  used  to  consult  the  oracles 
of  Dodona  or  Delphi  (which  eventually  became  the  most  celebrated  of  them  all)  on  all 
the£oacerns  of  life.  Modem  travelers  have  discovered  in  those  places  pipes  and  other 
secret  contrivances  from  which  they  have  concluded  that  these  oracles  were  constituted 
on  a  principle  of  falsehood  and  delusion.  Cicero,  too,  said  that  he  was  certain  two 
augurs  could  not  meet  without  laughing ;  and  he  was  likely  to  know,  for  he  had  once 
been  an  augur  himself.  But  I  confess  that  on  reading  Herodotus  there  £^pears  to  me 
to  have  been  very  little  quackery  about  it.  I  can  quite  readily  fancy  that  there  was  a 
great  deal  of  reason  in  the  oracle.  The  seat  of  that  at  Dodona  was  a  deep,  dark  chasm 
into  which  the  diviner  entered  when  he  sought  the  Deity.  If  he  was  a  man  of  devout 
frame  of  mind,  he  must  surely  have  then  been  in  the  best  state  of  feeling  for  foreseeing 
the  future,  and  giving  advice  to  others.  No  matter  how  this  was  carried  on — by  divi- 
nation or  otherwise — so  long  as  the  individual  suffered  himself  to  be  wrapt  in  union 
with  a  higher  being.  I  like  to  believe  better  of  Greece  than  that  she  was  completely  at 
the  mercy  of  fraud  and  falsehood  in  these  matters. 

So  it  was  that  Pheidippides,  the  runner,  met  Pan  in  the 
mountain  gorge.*    "  When  I  consider  the  frame  of  mind  he 

*CarIyle  tells  the  story  of  Pheidippides  evidently  from  memory,  and  not  quite 


•.Carlyle 
acouately. 


288  THE  LIBRAR  V  jtfA GAZINE. 

must  have  been  in,  I  have  no  doubt  that  he  really  heard  in 
his  own  mind  that  voice  of  the  God  of  Nature  upon  the  wild 
mountain  side,  and  that  this  was  not  done  by  quackery  or 
falsehood  at  all."  But  above  and  around  and  behind  the 
Whole  system  of  polytheism  there  was  a  truth  discovered  by 
the  Greeks — 

that  truth  which  is  in  every  man^s  heart,  and  to  which  no  thinking  man  can  refuse 
his  assent.  They  recognized  a  destiny !  a  great,  dumb,  black  power,  ruling  during 
time,  which  knew  nobody  for  its  master,  and  in  its  decrees  was  as  inflexible  as  ada- 
mant, and  every  one  knew  that  it  was  there.  It  was  sometimes  called  "  Moira,'*  or  allot- 
ment, part,  and  sometimes  *'  the  Unchangeable."  Their  gods  were  not  always  mentioiMd 
with  reverence.  There  is  a  strange  document  on  the  point,  the  Prometheus  of  iEschy- 
lus.  iBschylus  wrote  three  plays  of  Prometheus,  but  only  one  has  survived.  Prome- 
theus had  introduced  fire  into  the  world,  and  was  punished  for  that :  his  design  was  to 
make  our  race  a  little  less  wretched  than  it  was.  Personally  he  seems  to  be  a  taciturn 
sort  of  man,  but  what  he  does  speak  seems  like  a  thunderbolt  against  Jupiter.  .... 
Jupiter  can  hurl  him  to  Tartarus ;  his  time  is  coming  too  ;  he  must  come  down  ;  it  is 
all  written  in  the  book  of  destiny.  This  curious  document  really  indicates  the  prime- 
val qualities  of  man. 

Stories  from  Herodotus,  "  who  was  a  clear-headed,  candid 
man,"  of  the  Scythian  nation  who  shot  arrows  in  the 
stormy  air  against  their  god,  and  of  another  people  who  made 
war  upon  the  south-wind,  similarly  illustrate  that  the^cient 
reverence  for  their  deities  was  not  the  reverence  for  that 
which  is  highest  or  most  powerful  in  the  universe. 

From  the  religion  we  pass  (Lecture  II.)  to  the  literature  of 
the  Greeks.  "The  'Iliad,'  or  *Song  of  Ilion,'  consists  of  a 
series  of  what  I  call  ballad  delineations  of  the  various  occur- 
rences which  took  place  then,  rather  than  a  narrative  of  the 
event  itself.  For  it  begins  in  the  middle  of  it,  and,  I  might 
say,  ends  in  the  middle  of  it."  The  only  argument  in  favor  of 
Homer  being  the  real  author  is  derived  from  the  common 
opinion  and  from  the  unity  of  the  poem. 

There  appears  to  me  to  be  a  great  improbability  that  any  one  would  compose  an  epic 
except  in  writing.  ...  I  began  myself  some  time  ago  to  read  the  Iliad,  which  I  bad 
not  looked  at  since  I  left  school,  and  I  must  confess  that  from  reading  alone  I  became 
completely  convinced  that  it  was  not  the  work  of  one  man.  ...  As  to  its  unity — its 
value  does  not  consist  in  ah  excellent  sustaining  of  characters.  There  is  not  at  all  the 
sort  of  style  in  which  Shakespeare  draws  his  characters  ;  there  is  simply  the  cunning 
man,  the  great-headed,  coarse,  stupid  man,  the  proud  man  ;  but  there  is  nothing  so 
remarkable  but  that  any  one  else  could  have  drawn  the  same  characters  for  the  pur- 
pose of  piecing  them  into  the  Iliad.     Wc  all  know  the  old  Italian  comedy,  their  Harie- 


'  CARLYLE'S  LECTURES,        '  289 

quin,  doctor,  and  Columbine.  There  are  almost  similar  things  in  the  characters  in  the 
Iliad. 

In  fact  the  "  Ilia^  "  has  such  unity — not  more  and  not  less 
—as  the  modern  collection  of  our  old  Robin  Hood,  ballads. 

Contrasting  the  melodious  Greek  mind  with  the  not  very  melodious  English  mind, 
the  dthara  with  the  fiddle  (between  which,  by  the  way,  <here  is  strong  resemblance), 
and  having  in  remembrance  that  those  of  the  one  class  were  sung  in  alehouses,  while 
the  other  were  sung  in  Icings'  palaces,  it  really  appears  that  Robin  Hood's  ballads  have 
reeeived  the  very  same  arrangement  as  that  which  in  other  times  produced  **  the  tale 
of  Troy  divine." 

•      The  poetry  of  Homer  possesses  the  highest  qualities  be- 
I   cause  it  delineates  what  is  ancient  and  simple,  the  impres- 
sions of  a  primeval  mind.     Further, 

Homer  does  not  seem  to  believe  his  story  to  be  a  fiction  ;  but  has  no  doubt  it  is  a  truth. 
...  I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  Homer  could  have  sworn  to  the  truth  of  his  poems 
before  a  jury — far  from  it — but  that  he  repeated  what  had  survived  in  tradition  and 
records,  and  expected  his  readers  to  believe  them  as  he  did. 

With  respect  to  the  "  machinery,"  gods  and  goddesses.  Homer 
was  not  decorating  his  poem  with  pretty  fictions.  Any  re- 
markable man  then  might  be  regarded  as  supernatural ;  the 
experience  of  the  Greeks  was  narrow,  and  men's  hearts  were 
open  to  the  marvelous. 

Thus  Pindar  mentions  that  Neptune  appeared  on  one  occasion  at  Nemean*  games. 

Here  it  is  conceivable  that  if  some  aged  individual  of  venerable  mien  and  few  words 

%  had  in  fact  come  thither  his  appearance  would  have  attracted  attention  ;  people  would 

have  come  to  gaze  upon  him,  and  conjecture  have  been  busy.  It  would  be  natural  that 

a  succeeding  generation  should  actually  report  that  a  god  appeared  upon  the  earth. 

In  addition  to  these  excellences, 

the  poem  of  the  Iliad  was  actually  intended  to  be  sung ;  it  sings  itself,  not  only  the 
cadenCe,  but  the  whole  thought  of  the  poem  sings  itself  as  it  were  ;  there  is  a  serious 
recitative  in  the  whole  matter.  .  .  .  With  these  two  qualities,  music  and  belief,  he 
places  his  mind  in  a  most  beautiful  brotherhood,  in  a  sincere  contact  with  his  own 
characters  ;  there  are  no  reticences  ;  he  allows  himself  to  expand  with  some  touching 
loveliness,  and  occasionally  it  may  be  with  an  awkwardness  that  carries  its  own  apology, 
upon  all  the  matters  that  come  in  view  of  the  subject  of  his  work. 

In  the  "  Odyssey  "  there  is  more  of  character,  more  of  unity, 
and  it  represents  a  higher  state  of  civilization.  Pallas,  who 
had  been  a  warrior,  now  becomes  the  Goddess  of  Wisdom. 
Ulysses,  in  the  "  Iliad,"  "  an  adroit,  shifting,  cunning  man," 
becomes  now  "of  a  tragic  significance."    He  is  now  "the 

*  Igthmian  ?    See  Pindar,  Olymp.  viii.  64. 
L.  M.— 10 


290  THE  LIBRA R  V  MA  GA  ZINE. 

much-ehduring,  a  most  endearing  of  epithets."  It  is  impos* 
sible  that  the  "  Odyssey  "  could  have  been  written  by  many 
different  people.  * 

As  to  detailed  beauties  of  Homer's  poetry,  we  have  a  touch- 
ing instance  in  Agamemnon's  calling  not  only  on  gods  but 
rivers  and  stars  to  witness  his  oath ;  "  he  does  not  say  what 
they  are,  but  he  feels  that  he  himself  is  a  mysterious  exist- 
ence, standing  by  the  side  of  them,  mysterious  existences." 
Sometimes  the  simplicity  of  Homer's  similes  make  us  smile; 
"but  there  is  great  kindness  and  veneration  in  the  smile." 
There  is  a  beautiful  formula  which  he  uses  to  describe  death : 

He  thumped  down  falling,  and  hb  arms  jingled  about  him.  Now,  trivial  as  this 
expression  may  at  first  appear,  it  does  convey  a  deep  insight  and  feeling  of  that  phe- 
nomenon. The  fall,  as  it  were,  of  a  sack  of  clay^  and  the  jingle  of  armor,  the  last 
sound  he  was  ever  to  make  throughout  time,  who  a  minute  or  two  before  was  alive  and 
vigorous,  and  now  falb  a  heavy  dead  mass.  .  .  .  But  we  must  quit  Homer.  There  is 
one  thing,  however,  which  I  ought  to  mention  about  Ulysses,  that  he  is  the  very 
model  of  the  type  Greek,  a  perfect  image  of  the  Greek  genius  ;  a  shifty,  nimble,  active 
man,  involved  in  difficulties,  but  every  now  and  then  bobbing  up  out  of  darknesa  and 
confusion,  victorious  and  intact. 

Passing  by  the  early  Greek  philosophers,  whose  most  valu- 
able contribution  to  knowledge  was  in  the  province  of  geom- 
etry, Carlyle  comes  to  Herodotus. 

His  work  b,  properly  speaking,  an  encyclopaedia  of  the  various  nations,  and  it  dis- 
plays in  a  striking  manner  the  innate  spirit  of  harmony  that  was  in  the  Greeks.  It 
begins  with  Croesus,  king  of  Lydia  ;  upon  some  hint  or  other  it  suddenly  goes  off  into 
a  digression  on  the  Persians,  and  then,  apropos- of  something  else,  we  have  a  disquisi- 
tion on  the  Egyptians,  and  so  on.  At  first  we  feel  somewhat  impatient  of  being  thus 
carried  away  at  the  sweet  will  of  the  author  ;  but  we  soon  find  it  to  be  the  result  pf  an 
instinctive  spirit  of  harmony,  and  we  see  all  these  various  branches  of  the  tale  come 
pouring  down  at  last  in  the  invasion  of  Greece  by  the  Persians.  It  b  that  spirit  of  order 
which  has  constituted  him  the  prose  poet  of  hb  country.  ...  It  b  mainly  throu|^ 
him  that  we  become  acquainted  with  Themistocles,  that  model  of  the  type  Greek  .in 
prose,  as  Ulysses  was  in  song.  ... 

Contemporary  with  Themistocles,  and  a  little  prior  to  Herodotus,  Greek  tragedy 
began.  i'Cschylus  I  define  to  have  been  a  truly  gigantic  man— one  of  the  latgest  char- 
acters ever  known,  and  all  whose  movements  are  clumsy  and  huge  like  those  of  a  son 
of  Anak.  In  short,  his  character  is  just  that  of  Prometheus  himself  as  he  has  described 
him.  I  know  no  more  pleasant  thing  than  to  study  i¥lschylus  ;  you  fancy  you  hear 
the  old  dumb  rocks  speaking  to  you  of  all  things  they  had  been  thinking  of  since  the 
world  began,  in  their  wild,  savage  utterances. 

Sophocles  translated  the  drama  into  a  choral  peal  of  ittel* 
ody.    "  The  '  Antigone '  is  the  finest  thing  of  the  kind  ever 


CARL  VLB 'S  LECTURES.  29I 

sketched  by  man."  Euripides  writes  for  effect's  sake,  "  but 
how  touching  is  the  effect  produced  !  " 

Socrates,  as  viewed  by  Carlyle,  is  "  the  emblem  of  the  de- 
cline of  the  Greeks,"  when  literature  was  becoming  specula- 
tive. 

\  wilHngty  admit  that  he  was  a  man  of  deep  feeling  and  morality  ;  but  I  can  well 
tmdetstand  the  idea  which  Aristophanes  had  of  him,  that  he  was  a  man  going  to  destroy 
ailOHttce  with  his  innovation.  .  .  .  H<Ahows  a  lingering  land  of  awe  and  attachment 
few  die  old  religion  of  his  country,  and  often  we  cannot  make  out  whether  he  be- 
Uered  in  it  or  not.  He  must  havt  had  but  a  painful  intellectual  life,  a  painful  kind  of 
life  altogether  one  would  think.  ...  He  devoted  himsdf  to  the  teaching  of  morality 
and  virtue,  and  he  spent  his  life  in  that  kind  of  mission.  I  cannot  say  that  there  was 
any  ci^  in  this  ;  but  it  does  seem  to  me  to  have  been  of  a  character  entirely  unprofit- 
able^  I  have  a  great  desire  to  admire  Socrates,  but  I  o>nfess  that  his  writings  seem  to 
be  made  up  of  a  number  of  "very  wire-drawn  notions  about  virtue ;  there  Ls  no  conclii- 
skm.  in  him  ;  there  is  no  word  of  life  in  Socrates.  He  was,  however,  personally  a  co- 
boent  and  firm  man. 

We  pass  now  (Lectures  III.)  to  the  Romans. 

We  may  say  of  this  nation  that  as  the  Greeks  may  be  compared  to  the  children  of 
andqtaity  from  their  naivete  and  gracefulness,  while  their  whole  history  is  an  aurora, 
the  dawn  of  a  hif^r  culture  and  civilization,  so  the  Romans  were  the  meh  of  antiquity, 
aad  ykakt  history  a  glorious,  warm,  laborious  day,  less  beautiful  and  graceful  no  doubt 
than  the  Greeks,  but  more  essentially  useful.  .  .  .  The  Greek  life  was  shattered  to 
pieces  against  thehdrder,  stronger  life  of  the  Romdns.  ...  It  was  just  as  a  beautiful 
CTjr^ital  jar  becomes  dashed  to  pieces  upon  the  hard  rocks,  so  inexpressible  was  the  force 
of  the  strong  Roman  energy.* 

The  Romans  show  the  character  of  two  distinct  species  of 
people — the  Pelasgi  and  the  Etruscans.  The  old  Etruscans, 
besides  possessing  a  certain  genius  for  art,  were  an  agricul- 
tural people — 

endowed  with  a  sort  of  sulten  energy,  and  with  a  spirit  of  intensely  industrious  thrift, 
aUtid  of  vigorous  thrift.  Thus  with  respect  to  the  plowing  of  the  earth,  they  declare  it 
tobfc  a  kind  of  blasphemy  against  nature  to  leave  a  clod  unbroken.  .  .  .  Now  this  feeling 
vathe  fundamental  characteristic  of  the  Roman  people  before  they  were  distin- 
gtii^ed  as  conquerors.  Thrift  is  a  quality  held  in  no  esteem,  and  is  generally  re- 
gsurded  as  mean ;  it  is  certainly  mean  enough,  and  objectionable  from  its  interfering 
with  all  manner  of  intercourse  between  man  and  man.  But  I  can  say  that  thrift  well 
tuKferstood  includes  in  itself  the  best  virtues  that  a  man  can  have  in  the  world ;  it 
teaches  him  self-denial,  to  postpone  the  present  to  the  future,  to  calculate  his  means, 
and  rq;ulate  his  actions  accordingly  ;  thus  understood,  it  includes  all  that  man  can  do 
in  bk  vocation.    Even  in  its  worst  state  it  Indicates  a  great  people.t 

Joined  with  this  thrift  there  was  in  the  Romans  a  great 

*  Here  Cariyle  speaks  of  Niebuhr,  whose  book  *'  is  altogether  a  laborioos  thing,  but 
Ixaftords  after  all  very  little  light  on  the  eariy  period  of  Roman  history." 
t  See,  1»  the  same  effect,  **  a  certain  editor  '*  in  "  Frederick  the  Great,"  b.  iv.  chap.  4. 


292  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

seriousness  and  devoutness ;  and  they  made  the  pagan  notion 
of  fate  much  more  productive  of  consequences  than  the 
Greeks  did,  by  their  conviction  that  Rome  was  fated  to  rule 
the  world.  And  it  was  good  for  the  world  to  be  ruled  sternly 
and  strenuously  by  Rome  :  it  is  the  true  liberty  to  obey. 

That  stubborn  grinding  down  of  the  globe  which  their  ancestors  practiced,  i>lowuig 
the  ground  fifteen  times  to  make  it  produce  a  better  crop  than  if  it  were  plowed  four- 
teen times,  the  same  was  afterwards  carried  ou^by  the  Romans  in  all  the  concerns  of 
their  ordinary  life,  and  by  it  they  raised  themselves  above. all  other  people.  Method 
was  their  principle  just  as  harmony  was  of  the  Greeks.  The  method  of  the  Romans 
was  a  sort  of  harmony,  but  not  that  beautiful  graceful  thing  which  was  the  Greek  bar' 
mony.  Theirs  was  a  harmony  of  plans,  an  architectural  harmony,  which  was  displayed 
in  the  arranging  of  practical  antecedents  and  consequences. 

The  "crowning  phenomenon"  of  their  history  was  the 
struggle  with  Carthage.  The  Carthaginians  were  like  the 
Jews,  a  stiff-necked  people ;  a  people  proverbial  for  injustice. 

I  most  sincerely  rejoice  that  they  did  not  subdue  the  Romans,  but  that  the  Romans 
got  the  better  of  them.  We  have  indications  which  show  that  they  were  a  mcsm  peo- 
ple compared  to  the  Romans,  who  thought  of  nothing  but  commerce,  would  do  any- 
thing for  money,  and  were  exceedingly  cruel  in  their  measures  of  aggrandizement  and 
in  all  their  measures.  .  .  .  How  the  Romans  got  on  after  that  we  can  see  by  the  Com^, 
mentaries  which  Julius  Cssar  has  left  us  of  his  own  proceedings  ;  how  he  spent  ten 
years  of  campaigns  in  Gaul,  cautiously  planning  all  his  measures  before  he  attempted 
to  carry  them  into  effect.  It  is,  indeed,  a  most  interesting  book,  and  evinces  the 
indomitable  force  of  Roman  energy  ;  the  triumph  of  civil,  methodic  man  over  wild  and 
barbarous  man. 

Before  Caesar  the  government  of  Rome  seems  to  have 
been  a 

very  tumultuous  kind  of  polity,  a  continual  struggle  between  the  patricians  and  ple- 
beians. .  .  .  Therefore  I  cannot  join  in  the  lamentations  made  by  some  over  thedown- 
fall  of  the  republic,  when  Caesar  took  hold  of  it.  It  had  been  but  a  constant  strug- 
gling scramble  for  prey,  and  it  was  well  to  end  it,  and  to  sec  the  wisest,  cleanest,  and 
most  judicious  man  of  them  place  himself  at  the  top  of  it.  .  .  .  And  what  an  empire 
was  it !  Teaching  mankind  tliat  they  should  be  tilling  the  ground,  as  they  ought  to  be, 
instead  of  fighting  one  another.  For  that  is  the  real  thing  which  every  man  is  called 
on  to  do — to  till  the  ground,  and  not  to  slay  his  poor  brother-man. 

Coming  now  to  their  language  and  literature — the  peculi- 
arly distinguishing  character  of  the  language  is  "  its  impera- 
tive sound  and  structure,  finely  adapted  to  command."  Their 
greatest  work  was  written  on  the  face  of  the  planet  in  which 
we  live ;  and  all  their  great  works  were  done  spontaneously 
through  a  deep  instinct. 

The  point  is  not  to  be  able  to  write  a  book ;  the  point  is  to  have  the  true  mind  fori^ 


CARL  YLE  'S  LECTURES.  293 

Everything  in  that  case  which  a  nation  does  will.be  equally  significant  of  its  mind.  If 
any  great  man  among  the  Romans,  Julius  Caesar  or  Cato  for  example,  had  never  done 
anything  but  till  the  groutid,  they  would  have  acquired  equal  excellence  in  that  way 
They  would  have  plowed  as  they  conquered.  Everything  a  great  man  does  carries  the 
traces  of  a  great  man. 

Virgil's  "  ^neid  " 

ranks  as  an  epic  poem,  and,  one,  too,  of  the  same  sort  in  name  as  the  Iliad  of  Homer. 
But  I  think  it  entirely  a  different  poem,  and  very  inferior  to  Homer,  ^here  is  that 
fatal  consciousness,  that  knowledge  that  he  is  writing  an  epic.  The  plot,  the  style, 
alf-is  vitiated  by  that  one  fault.  The  characters  too,  are  none  of  them  to  be  compared 
to  the  healthy,  whole-hearted,  robust  men  of  Homer,  the  much  enduring  Ulysses,  or 
Achilles,  or  Agamemnon,  i^'.neas,  the  hero  of  the  poem,  is  a  lachrymose  sort  of  man 
^together.  He  is  introduced  in  the  middle  of  a  storm,  but  instead  of  handling  the 
tackle  and  doing  what  he  can  for  the  ship,  he  sits  still,  groaning  over  his  misfortunes. 
".Was  ever  mortal,"  he  asks,  "  so  unfortunate  as  I  am  ?  Chased  from  port  to  port  by 
the  persecuting  deities,  who  give  no  respite,"  and  so  on ;  and  then  he  tells  them  how  he 
is  **the  pious  iEneas,"  In  short,  he  is  just  that  sort  of  lachrymose  man  ;  there  is 
hardly  anything  of  a  man  in  the  inside  of  him. 

"When  he  let  himself  alone/*  Virgil  was  a  great  poet, 
admirable  in  his  description  of  natural  scenery,  and  in  his 
women ;  an  amiable  man  of  mild  deportment,  called  by  the 
people  of  Naples  "the  maid."  "The  effect  of  his  poetry  is 
like  that  of  some  laborious  mosaic  of  many  years  in  putting 
together.  There  is  also  the  Roman  method,  the  Roman  am- 
plitude and  regularity."  His  friend  Horace  is  "  sometimes 
not  at  all  edifying  in  his  sentiments ;"  too  Epicurean ;  "  he 
displays  a  worldly  kind  of  sagacity,  but  it  is  a  great  sagacity." 
After  these,  Roman  literature  quickly  degenerated. 

If  we  want  an  example  of  diseased  self-consciousness  and  exaggerated  imagination, 
a  mind  blown  up  with  all  sorts  of  strange  conceits,  the  spasmodic  state  of  intellect,  in 
short,  of  a  man  morally  unable  to  speak  the  truth  on  any  subject — we  have  it  in  Sene- 
ca. ...  I  willingly  admit  that  he  had  a  strong  desire  to  be  sincere,  and  that  he 
endeavored  to  convince  himself  that  he  was  right,  but  even  this  when  in  connection 
with  the  rest  constitutes  of  itself  a  fault  of  a  dangerous  kind. 

But — such  is  the  power  of  genius  to  make  itself  heard  at  all 
times — the  most  significant  and  the  greatest  Roman  writers 
appeared  later  than  Seneca. 

In  the  middle  of  all  that  quackery  and  puffery  coming  into  play  turn  about  in  every 
department,  when  critics  wrote  books  to  teach  you  how  to  hold  your  arm  and  your 
leg,  in  the  middle  of  all  this  absurd  and  wicked  period  Tacitus  was  bom,  and  was 
enabled  to  be  a  Roman  after  all.  He  stood  like  a  Colossus  at  the  edge  of  a  dark  night, 
and  he  sees  events  of  all  kinds  hurrying  past  him,  and  plunging  he  knew  not  where, 
hot  evidently  to  no  good,  for  falsehood  and  cowardice  never  yet  ended  anywhere  but 
in  destruction. 


294-  THE  LIBRAR  V  MA GAZINE, 

Yet  he  writes  with  grave  calmness,  he  does  not  seem  star- 
tled, he  is  convinced  that  it  will  end  well  somehow  or  other, 
"  for  he  has  no  belief  but  the  old  Roman  belief,  full  of  their 
old  feelings  of  goodness  and  honesty."  Carlyle  closes  his 
view  of  pagan  literature  with  that  passage  in  which  Tacitus 
speaks  of  the  origin  of  the  sect  called  Christians : 

It  was  give»  to  Tacitus  to  see  dee|>er  into  the  matter  than  appears  from  the  above 
account  of  it.  But  he  and  the  great  empire  were  soon  to  pass  away  forever ;  and  it 
was  this  despised  sect — this  Christiis  Quidam — it  was  in  this  new  character  that  all  the 
future  world  lay  hid. 

The  transition  period  (Lecture  IV.),  styled  the  "millen- 
nium of  darkness,*'  was  really  a  great  and  fertile  period,  dui;- 
ing  which  belief  was  conquering  unbelief;  conquering  it  not 
by  force  of  argument  but  through  the  heart,  and  "  by  the  con- 
viction of  men  who  spoke  into  convincible  minds."  Belief — 
that  is  the  great  fact  of  the  time.  The  last  belief  left  by 
paganism  is  seen  in  the  stoic  philosophers—  belief  in  one's  self, 
belief  in  the  high,  royal  nature  of  man.  But  in  their  opinions 
a  great  truth  is  extremely  exaggerated  :— 

That  bold  assertion  for  example,  in  the  face  of  all  reason  and  fact,  that  pain  and 
pleasure  the  same  thing,  that  man  is  indifferent  to  both.  ...  If  we  look  into  the 
Christian  religion,  that  digniiication  of  man's  life  and  nature,  we  shall  find  indeed  this 
also  in  it, — to  believe  in  one's  self.  .  .  .  But  then  how  unspeakably  more  human  is  this 
belief,  not  held  in  proud  scorn  and  contempt  of  other  men,  in  cynical  disdain  or  indig- 
nation at  their  paltriness,  but  received  by  exterminating  pride  altogether  from  the 
mind,  and  held  in  d^radation  and  deep  human  sufferings. 

Christianity  reveals  the  divinity  of  human  sorrow. 

In  another  point  of  view  we  may  r^ard  it  as  the  revelation  of  eternity :  Every  man 
may  with  truth  say  that  he  waited  for  a  whole  eternity  to  be  bom,  and  that  he  has  a 
whole  eternity  waiting  to  see  what  he  will  do  now  that  he  is  bom.  It  is  eternity,  a 
significance  it  never  had  without  it.  It  is  thus  an  infinite  arena,  where  infinite  issaes 
are  played  out.  Not  an  action  of  man  but  will  have  its  truth  realized  and  will  go  on 
forever.  .  .  .  This  truth,  whatever  may  be  the  opinions  we  hold  on  Christian  doctrine, 
or  whether  we  hold  upon  them  a  sacred  silence  or  not,  we  must  recognize  In  Christian- 
ity and  its  belief  independent  of  all  theories. 

If  to  the  character  of  the  new  faith  we  add  the  character  of 
the  Northern  people,  we  have  the  two  leading  phenomena  ot 
the  middle  ages.  With  much  shrewdness,  the  still  rude 
societies  of  Europe  find  their  way  to  order  and  quiet.  Then, 
there  was  that  thing  which  we  call  loyalty.  In  these  times  of 
our  own 


CARL  YLE'S  LECTURES,  295 , 

loyalty  is  much  kept  out  of  sight,  and  little  appreciated,  and  many  mind^  regard  it  as 
a  sort  of  obsolete  chimera,  looking  more  to  independence  and  sume  such  thing,  now 
regarded  as  a  great  virtue.  And  this  is  very  just,  and  most  suitable  to  this  time  of 
movement  and  progress.  It  must  be  granted  at  once  that  to  exact  loyalty  to  things  so 
bad  as  to  be  not  worth  being  loyal  to  is  quite  an  unsupportable  thing,  and  one  that  the 
worid  would  spurn  at  once.  This  must  be  conceded  ;  yet  the  better  thinkers  will  see 
that  loyalty  is  a  principle  perennial  in  human  nature,  the  highest  that  unfolds  itself 
there  in  a  temporal,  secular  point  of  view.  In  the  middle  ages  it  was  the  noblest 
phenomenon,  the  finest  phasis  in  society  anywhere.  Loyalty  was  the  foundation  of 
the  state. 

Another  cardinal  point  was  the  church,  "Like  all  other 
matters,  there  were  contradictions  and  inconsistencies  with- 
out end,  but  it  should  be  regarded  in  its  ideal."  Hildebrand 
represents  the  mediaeval  church  at  its  highest  power.  "  He 
has  been  regarded  by  some  classes  of  Protestants  as  the 
wickedest  of  men,  but  I  do  hope  at  this  time  we  have  out-  ' 
grown  all  thak  .He  perceived  th^t  the  church  was  the  high- 
est thing  in  the  world,  and  he  resolved  that  it  should  be  at 
the  top  of  the  whole  world,  anim^iting  human  things,  and 
giving  them  their  main  guidance."  Having  described  the 
humiliation  of  the  emperor,  Henry  the  Fourth,  at  the. castle 
of  Canossa,  Carlyle  proceeds : — 

One  would  think  from  all  this  that  Hildebrand  was  a  proud  man,  but  he  was  not  a 
proud  man  at  all,  and  seems  from  many  circumstances  to  have  been  on  the  contrary  a 
man  of  very  great  humility  ;  but  here  he  treated  himself  as  the  representative  of  Christ, 
and  for  beyond  all  earthly  authorities.  In  these  circumstances  doubtless  there  are 
many  questionable  things,  but  then  there  are  many  cheering  things.  For  we  see  the  son 
of  a  poor  Tuscan  peasant,  solely  by  the  superior  spiritual  love  that  was  in  him,  humble 
a  great  emperor,  at  the  head  of  the  iron  force  of  Europe,  and,  to  look  at  it  in  a  toler- 
.  able  point  of  view,  it  is  really  very  grand  ;  it  is  the  spirit  of  Europe  set  above  the  body 
of  E4irope  ;  the  mind  triumphant  over  the  brute  force.  .  .  .  Some  have  feared  that  the 
tendency  of  such  things  is  to  found  a  theocracy,  and  have  imagined  that  if  this  had 
gone  on  till  our  day  a  most  abject  superstiti6n  would  have  become  established  ;  but 
this  is  entirely  a  vain  theory.  The  clay  that  is  about  man  is  always  sufficiently  ready 
to  assert  its  rights  ;  the  danger  is  always  th«  other  way,  that  the  spiritual  part  of  man 
will  become  overlaid  with  his  bodily  part.  This  then  was  the  church,  which  with  the 
loyalty  of  the  time  were  the  two  hinges  of  society,  and  that  society  was  in  consequence 
distinguished  from  all  societies  which  have  preceded  it,  presenting  an  infinitely  greater 
diversity  of  views,  a  better  humanity,  a  largeness  of  capacity.  This  society  has  since 
undergone  many  changes,  but  I  hope  that  that  spirit  may  go  on  for  countless  ages,  the 
spirit  which  at  that  period  was  set  going. 

The  grand  apex  of  that  life  was  the  Crusades. 

One  sees  Peter  [the  Hermit]  riding  along,  dressed  in  his  brown  cloak,  with  the  rope 
of  the  penitent  tied  round  him,  carrying  all  hearts,  and  burning  them  up  with  zeal, 
and  stirring  up  steel-clad  Europe  till  it  shook  itself  at  the  words  of  Peter.    What  a 


296  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

contrast  to  the  greatest  of  orators,  Demosthenes,  spending  nights  and  years  in  the 
construction  of  those  balanced  sentences  which  are  still  read  with  admiration,  descend- 
ing into  the  smalle.st  details,  speaking  with  pebbles  in  his  mouth  and  the  waves  of  the 
sea  beside  him,  and  all  his  way  of  life  in  this  manner  occupied  during  many  years,  and 
then  to  end  in  simply  nothing  at  all ;  for  he  did  nothing  for  his  country  -wiih  all  his 
eloquence.  And  then  see  ihis  poor  monk  start  here  without  any  art ;  for  as  Demosthe- 
nes was  once  asked  what  was  the  secret  of  a  fine  orator,  and  he  replied  Action,  Action, 
Action,  so,  if  I  were  asked  it,  I  should  say  Belief,  Belief,  Belief.  .  .  .  Some  have 
admired  the  Crusades  because  they  served  to  bring  all  Europe  into  communication  with 
itself,  others,  because  it  produced  the  elevation  of  the  middle  classes  •  but  I  say  that  the 
great  result  which  characterizes  and  gives  them  all  their  merits,  is  that  in  them  Europe 
for  one  moment  proved  its  belief,  proved  that  it  believed  in  the  invisible  world,  which 
surrounds  the  outward  and  visible  world,  that  this  belief  had  for  once  entered  into  the 
consciousness  of  man. 

It  was  not  an  age  for  literature.  The  noble  made  his  signa- 
ture by  dipping  the  glove-mailed  hand  into  the  ink  and  im- 
printing' it  on  the  charter.  But  heroic  lives  were  lived,  if 
heroic  poems  were  not  written  ;  an  ideal  did  exist ;  the  heroic 
heart  was  not  then  desolate  and  alone  ;  the  great  result  of  the 
time  was  "  a  perpetual  struggling  forward."  And  a  literature 
did  come  at  last;  beautiful,  childlike  utterances  of  troubador 
and  trouvere ;  lasting,  however,  but  a  little  while,  in  cotise^ 
quence  of  the  rise  of  a  kind  of  feeling  adverse  to  the  spirit  of 
harmony.  Petrarch,  the  troubador  of  Italy,  and  the  Nibelun- 
genlied  represent  the  period.  The  spirit  of  the  age  did  not 
speak  much,  but  it  was  lost.  "  It  is  not  so  ordered."  When 
we  hear  rude,  natural  voices  singing  in  the  distance,  all  is 
true  and  bright,  because  all  false  notes  destroy  one  another 
and  are  absorbed  in  the  air  before  they  reach  us,  and  only 
the  true  notes  come  to  us.  So  in  the  middle  ages  we  only 
get  the  heroic  essence  of  the  whole. 

Of  the  new-formed  nation-s  the  Italian  "first  possesses  a 
claim  on  our  solicitude."  (Lecture  V.)*  Though  Italy  was 
not  a  great  political  power,  she  produced  a  greater  number  of 
great  men  distinguished  in  art,  thinking  and  conduct  than 
any  other  country — and  to  produce  great  men  is  the  highest 
thing  any  land  can  do.  The  spokesman  of  Italy  in  literature 
is  Dante — one  who  stands  beside  ^schylus  and  Shakespeare, 

*  I  made  few  excerps  from  this  lecture,  for  a  good  part  of  its  substance  appeatsii 
the  lecture  "  The  Hero  as  Poet,"  in  "  Heroes  andHero-worship." 


sare,     I 

atsk      I 


CARLYLE'S  LECTURES,  297 

and  "we  really  cannot  and  deara  another  great  to  these."  ' 
The  idea  of  his  "  Divina  Commedia,"  with  its  three  kingdoms 
of  eternity,  is  "  the  greatest  idea  that  we  have  ever  got  at." 
"  I  think  that  when  all  records  of  Catholicism  have  passed 
away,  when  the  Vatican  shall  be  crumbled  into  dust,  and  St. 
Peter's  and  Strasburg  minster  be  no  more,  for  thousands  of 
years  to  come  Catholicism  will  survive  in  this  sublime  relic 
of  antiquity."  Dante  is  great  in  his  wrath,  his  scorn,  his  pity ; 
great  above  all  in  his  sorrow.  His  greatness  of  heart,  united 
with  his  greatness  of  intellect,  determine  his  character ;  and 
Itis  poem  sings  itself,  has  both  insight  and  song.  Dante  does 
not  seem  to  know  that  he  is  doing  anything  very  remarkable, 
differing  herein  from  Milton. 

In  all  his  delineations  he  has  a  most  beautiful,  sharp  grace,  the  quickest  and  clearest 
intellect ;  it  is  just  that  honesty  with  which  his  mind  was  set  upon  his  subject  that 
carries  it  out.  .  .  .  Take  for  example  his  description  of  the  city  of  Dis  to  which  Virgil 
carries  him  ;  it  possesses  a  beautiful  simplicity  and  honesty.  The  light  was  so  dim  that 
people  could  hardly  see,  and  they  winked  at  him,  just  as  people  wink  with  their  eyes 
under  the  new  moon,  or  as  an  old  tailor  winks  threading  his  needle  when  his  eyes  are 
not  good. 

The  passage  about  Francesca  is  "  as  tender  as  the  voice  of 
mothers,  full  of  the  gentlest  pity,  though  there  is  much  stern 
tragedy  in  it.  .  .  .  The  whole  is  beautiful,  like  a  clear  piping 
voice  heard  in  the  middle  of  a  whirlwind ;  it  is  so  sweet,  and 
gentle,  and  good."  The  "  Divine  Comedy  "  is  not  a  satire  on 
Dante's  enemies. 

It  was  written  in  the  pure  spirit  of  justice.  Thus  he  pitied  poor  Francesca,  and 
VQuld  not  have  willingly  placed  her  in  that  torment,  but  it  was  the  justice  of  God's 
law  that  doomed  her  there.  .  .  .  Sudden  and  abrupt  movements  are  frequent  in 
Dante.  He  is  mdeed  full  of  what  I  can  call  military  movements.  .  .  .  Those  passages 
are  very  striking  where  he  alludes  to  his  own  sad  fortunes  ;  there  is  in  them  a  wild 
sorrow,  a  savage  tone  of  truth,  a  breaking  heart,  the  hatred  of  Florence,  and  with  it  the 
love  oif  Florence.  .  .  .  His  old  schoolmaster  tells  him  "  If  thou  follow  thy  star  thou 
catiat  not  mi.ss  a  happy  harbor."  That  was  just  it.  That  star  occasionally  shone  on 
him  from  the  blue,  eternal  depths,  and  he  felt  he  was  doing  something  good  ;  he  soon 
lost  it  again  ;  lost  it  again  as  he  fell  back  into  the  trough  of  the  sea.  .  .  .  Bitter !  bitter', 
poor  exile, — none  but  scoundrelly  persons  to  associate  with.  .  .  .  The  Inferno  has 
become  of  late  times  mainly  the  favorite  of  the  three  [parts  of  the  poem]  ;  it  has 
harmonized  well  with  the  taste  of  the  last  thirty  or  forty  years,  in  which  Europe  has 
seemed  to  covet  more  a  violence  of  emotion  and  a  strength  of  convulsion  than  almost 
any  other  quality.  .  .  .  but  I  question  whether  the  Purgatorio  is  not  better,  and  a 
greater  thing.  .  .  .  Men  have  of  course  ceased  to  believe  these  things,  that  there  is  the 
mountain  rising  up  in  the  ocean  there,  or  that  there  are  those  Malebolgic  gulfs  ;  but 


298  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

still  men  of  any  knowledge  at  all  must  believe  that  there  exists  the  inexorable  ju^ice 
of  God,  and  that  i)enitence  is  a  gre^t  thing  here  for  man  ;  for  life  is  but  a  series  of  errors 
made  good  again  by  repentance,  and  the  sacredness  of  that  doctrine  is  asserted  in  Dante 
in  a  manner  more  moral  than  anywhere  else.  .  .  .  One  can  well  understand  what  the 
Germans  say  of  the  three  partfe  of  the  "  Divina  Commedia,"  viz.,  that  the  first  is  the 
architectural,  plastic  part,  as  of  statuary  ;  the  second  is  the  pictorial  or  picturesque  ; 
the  third  is  the  musical,  the  melting  into  music,  song.     , 

Lecture  VI. — Dante's  way  of  thinking,  in  the  nature  of 
things,  could  not  long  continue.  With  an  increased  horizon 
of  knowledge,  his  theorj''  could  no  longer  fit.  "  All  theories 
approximate  more  or  less  to  the  great  theory  which  remains 
itself  always  unknown.  .  .  .  Every  philosophy  that  exists  is 
destined  to  be  embraced,  melted  down  as  it  were,  into  some 
larger  philosophy."  Universities,  the  art  o'f  printing,  gun- 
powder, were  changing  the  aspects  of  human  life  during  the 
two  centuries  that  lie  between  Dante  and  Cervantes.  Loy- 
alty and  the  Catholic  religion,  as  we  saw,  gave  their  character 
to  the  middle  ages.  Chivalry,  the  great  product  of  the  Span- 
ish nation,  is  a  practical  illustration  of  loyalty ;  and  chivalry 
includes,  with  the  German  valor  of  character,  another  Ger- 
man feature,  the  reverence  for  women.  The  Spanish  nation 
was  fitted  to  carry  chivalry  to  a  higher  perfection  than  it 
attained  anywhere  else. 

The  Spaniards  had  less  breadth  of  genius  than  the  Italians,  but  they  had,  on  the 
other  hand,  a  lofty,  sustained  enthusiasm  in  a  higher  degree  than  the  Italians,  with  a 
tinge  of  what  we  call  romance,  a  dash  of  oriental  exaggeration,  and  a  tenacious  vigor 
in  prosecuting  their  object :  of  less  depth  than  the  Germans,  of  less  of  that  composed 
silent  force  ;  yet  a  great  people,  calculated  to  be  distinguished. 

Its  early  heroes,  Viriathus  and  the  Cid  (whose  memory  is 
still  musical  among  the  people),  lived  silent;  their  works 
spoke  for  them.  The  first  great  Spanish  name  in  literature  is 
that  of  Cervantes.  His  life — ^that  of  a  man  of  action — is  told 
by  Carlyle  in  his  brief,  picturesque  manner.  Don  Quixote  is 
the  very  reverse  of  Dante,  yet  has  analogies  with  Dante.  It 
was  begun  as  a  satire  on  chivalry,  a  burlesque ;  but  as  Cer- 
vantes proceeds,  the  spirit  grows  on  him. 

In  his  Don  Quixote  he  portrays  his  own  character,  representing  himself,  with  good 
natural  irony,  mistaking  the  illusions  of  his  own  heart  for  realities.  But  he  proceeds 
;ver  more  and  more  harmoniously.  .  .  .  Above  all,  we  see  the  good-humored  cheexw 


J 


CARL  YLE  *S  LECTURES.  299 

faliMss  of  the  author  in  the  middle  of  his  unfortunate  destiny ;  never  provoked  with  it ; 
no  atrabiltar  quality  ever  obtained  any  mastery  in  his  mind.  .  .  .  Independently  of 
chivalry,  Don  Quixote  is  valuable  as  a  sort  of  sketch  of  the  perpetual  struggle  of  the 
human  soul.  We  have  the  hard  facts  of  this  world's  existence,  and  the  ideal  scheme 
struggling  with  these  in  a  high  enthusiastic  manner  delineated  there ;  and  for  this 
there  is  no  more  wholesome  vehicle  anywhere  than  irony.  .  .  .  If  he  had  given  us  only 
a  high-flown  panegyric  on  the  Age  of  ^old,*  he  would  have  found  no  ear  for  him  ;  it 
is  the  self-mockery  in  which  he  envelops  it,  which  reconciles  us  to  the  high  bursts  of 
enthusiasm,  and  will  keep  the  matter  alive  in  the  heart  as  long  as  there  are  men  to  read 
it.    It  is  the  poetry  of  comedy. 

Cervantes  possessed  in  an  eminent  degree  the  thing  critics 
call  humor. 

If  any  one  wish  to  know  the  difference  between  humor  and  wit,  the  laughter  of  the 
fool,  which  the  wise  man,  by  a  similitude  founded  on  deep  earnestness,  calls  the  crack- 
ling of  thorns  under  a  pot,  let  him  read  Cervantes  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other 
Voltaire,  the  greatest  laugher  the  world  ever  knew. 

Of  Calderon  Carlyle  has  not  read  much,  "  in  fact  only  one 
play  and  some  choice  specimens  collected  in  German  books," 
and  in  the  German  admiration  for  Calderon  he  suspects  there 
is  "very  much  of  forced  taste."  Lope  was  "a  man  of  a 
strange  facility,  but  of  much  shallowness  too,  and  greatly 
inferior  to  Calderon."  In  the  history  of  Spanish  literature 
there  are  only  these  two  besides  Cervantes.  Why  Spain 
declined  cannot  be  explained :  "  We  can  only  say  just  this, 
that  its  time  was  come."  The  lecture  closes  with  a  glance  at 
"  that  conflict  of  Catholicism  and  Chivalry  with  the  Reforma- 
tion commonly  called  the  Dutch  War." 

Lecture  VII. — ^The  Reformation  places  us  upon  German 
soil.  The  (German  character  had  a  deep  earnestness  in  it, 
proper  to  a  meditatiye  people.  The  strange  fierceness  known 
as  the  Berserkir  rage  is  also  theirs. 

Rage  of  that  sjprt,  defying  all  dangers  and  obstacles,  if  kept  down  sufficiently,  is  as  a 
central  fire  which  will  make  all  things  to  grow  on  the  surface  above  it.  .  .  .  On  the 
whole  it  is  the  best  character  that  can  belong  to  any  nation,  producing  strength  of  all 
sorts,  and  all  the  concomitants  of  strength — perseverance,  steadiness,  no|  easily  excited, 
but  when  it  is  called  up  it  will  have  its  object  accomplished.  We  And  it  in  all  their 
hbtory.  Justice,  that  is  another  of  its  concomitants  ;  strength,  one  may  say,  in  justice 
itself.  The  strong  man  is  he  that  can  be  just,  that  sets  everything  in  its  own  rightful 
place  one  above  the  other. 

Before  the  Reformation  there  had  been  two  great  appear- 

,      ♦  Carlyle  had  previously  made  particular  reference  to  the  scene  with  the  goat-herds. 


30a  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GA  ZIN^, 

ances  of  the  Germans  in  European  history — the  first  in  the 
overthrow  of  the  empire,  the  second  in  the  enfranchisement 
of  Switzerland.  The  Reformation  was  the  inevitable  result 
of  human  progress,  the  old  theory  no  longer  being  found  to 
fit  the  facts.  And  "  when  the  mind  begins  to  be  dubious 
about  a  creed,  it  will  rush  with  double  fury  toward  destruc- 
tion ;  for  all  serious  men  hate  dubiety." 

In  the  sixteenth  century  there  was  no  Pope  Hildebrand 
ready  to  sacrifice  life  itself  to  the  end  that  he  might  make  the 
church  the  highest  thing  in  the  world.  The  popes  did 
indeed  maintain  the  church,  "but  they  just  believed  noth- 
ing at  all,  or  believed  that  they  got  so  many  thousand 
crowns  a  year  by  it.  The  whole  was  one  chimera,  one  miser- 
able sham."  Any  one  inclined  to  see  things  in  their  proper 
light  "would  have  decided  that  it  was  better  to  have  nothing 
to  do  with  it,  but  crouch  down  in  an  obscure  corner  some- 
where, and  read  his  Bible,  and  gGt  what  good  he  can  for  him- 
self in  that  way,  but  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  Machiavel- 
lian policy  of  such  a  church." 

At  such  a  time  Luther  appeared,  Luther  "whose  life  was 
not  to  sink  into  a  downy  sleep  while  he  heard  the  great  call 
of  a  far  other  life  upon  him."*  His  character  presents  what- 
ever is  best  in  German  minds. 

He  is  the  image  of  a  large,  substantial  deep  man,  that  stands  upon  truth,  justice, 
fBirnes<i,  that  fears  nothing,  considers  the  right  and  calculates  on  nothing  else  ;  and 
a^am^  does  not  do  it  spasmodically,  but  quietly,  calmly  ;  no  need  of  any  noise  about 
)t ;  adheres  to  it  deliberately,  calmly,  through  good  and  bad  report.  Accordingly,  we 
fitid  hiru  a  good-humored,  jovial,  witty  man,  greatly  beloved  by  every  one,  and  though 
hU  W'.nU  were  half  battles,  as  Jean  Paul  says,  stronger  than  artillery,  yet  among  his 
fritiidh  lie  was  one  of  the  kindest  of  men.  The  wild  kind  of  force  t)iat  was  in  him 
appealer  in  the  physiognomy  of  the  portrait  by  Luke  Cranach,  his  painter  and  friend-; 
the  rc>ii^h  plebeian  countenance  with  all  sorts  of  noble  thoughts  shining  out  through 
It.     Tbivt  was  precisely  Luther  as  he  appears  through  his  whole  history. 

Erasmus  admitted  the  necessity  of  some  kind  of  reforma- 
tion : — 

But  that  he  should  risk  his  ease  and  comfort,  for  it  did  not  enter  into  his  calculations 
at  all.  ...  I  should  say,  to  make  my  friends  understand  the  character  of  Erasmus, 

*  Much  of  what  Carlyle  says  here  of  Luther  reappears  in  "  Heroes  and  Hero-wor^ 
:p.'> 


CARL  YLE'S  LECTURES.  '     301 ! 

that  he  is  more  like  Addison  than  any  other  writer  who  is  familiarly  known  in  this 
country.  .  .  .  He  was  a  man  certainly  of  great  merit,  nor  have  I  much  to  say  against 
him.  .  .  .  but  he  is  not  to  be  named  by  the  side  of  Luther, — a  mere  writer  of  poems,  a 
litcrateur.  ^ 

There  is  a  third  striking  German  character  whom  we  must 
notice,  Ulrich  Hutten — a  straggler  all  his  days ; 

much  too  headlong  a  man.  He  so  hated  injustice  that  he  did  not  know  how  to  deal 
with  it,  and  he  became  heart-broken  by  it  at  last.  .  .  .  He  says  of  himself  he  hated 
tumult  of  all  kinds,  and  it  was  a  painful  and  sad  position  for  him  that  wbhed  to  obey 
orders,  while  a  still  higher  order  commanded  him  to  disobey,  when  the  standing  by 
that  order  would  be  in  fact  the  standmg  by  disorder. 

> 

His  lifting  his  cap,  when  at  the  point  of  death,  because  he 
had  reverence  for  what  was  above  him,  to  the  archbishop 
who  had  caused  his  destruction;  "  seems  to  me  the  noblest, 
politest  thing  that  is  recorded  of  any  such  a  moment  as  that." 
And  the  worst  thing  one  reads  of  Erasmus  is  his  desertion  of 
Hutton  in  his  day  of  misfortune. 

The  English  nation  (Lecture  VIII.)  first  comes  into  deci- 
sive notice  about  the  time  of  the  Reformation.  In  the  Eng- 
lish character  there  is  "  a  kind  of  silent  ruggedness  of  nature* 
with  the  wild  Berserkir  rage  deeper  down  in  the  Saxon  than 
the  others."  English  talent  is  practical  like  that  of  the 
Romans,  a  greatness  of  perseverance,  adherence  to  a  purpose, 
method ;  practical  greatness,  in  short.  In  the  early  history 
before  Alfred,  "  we  read  of  battles  and  successions  of  kings, 
and  one  endeavors  to  remember  them,  but  without  success, 
except  so  much  of  this  flocking  and  fighting  as  Milton  gives 
us,  viz.,  that  they  were  the  battles  of  the  kites  and  crows." 
Yet  the  history  of  England  was  then  in  the  making.  ^*  Who- 
ever was  uprooting  a  thistle  or  bramble,  or  drawing  out  a 
bog,  or  building  himself  a  house,  or  in  short  leaving  a  single 
section  of  order  where  he  had  found  disorder,  that  man  was 
writing  the  history  of  England,  the  others  were  only  obstruct- 
ing it.  The  battles  themselves  were  a  means  of  ascertaining 
who  among  them  should  rule — ^who  had  most  force  and 
method  among  them.  A  wild  kind  of  intellect  as  well  as 
courage  and  traces  of  deep  feeling  are  scattered  over  thei' 


302  *  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

history.  There  was  an  affirmativeness,  a  largeness  of  soul,  in 
the  intervals  of  these  fights  Cf  kites  and  crows,  as  the  doings 
of  King  Alfred  show  us. 

About  the  time  of  Queen  Elizabeth  the  confused  elements 
amalgamated  into  some  distinct  vital  unity.  That  period  was 
*'  in  many  respects  the  summation  of  innumerable  influences, 
the  co-ordination  of  many  things  which  till  then  had  been  in 
contest,  the  first  beautiful  outburst  of  energy,  the  first  articu- 
late, spoken  energy."  After  centuries  the  blossom  of  poetry 
appeared  for  once.  Shakespeare  is  the  epitome  of  the  age 
of  Elizabeth ;  he  is  the  spokesman  of  our  nation ;  like 
Homer,  -^schylus,  and  Daijte,  a  voice  from  the  innermost 
heart  of  nature;  a  universal  man.*  His  intellect  was  far 
greater  than  that  of  any  other  that  has  given  an  account  of 
himself  by  writing  books.  "  There  is  no  tone  of  feeling  that  is 
not  capable  of  yielding  melodious  resonance  to  that  of  Shakes- 
peare." In  him  lay  "the  great,  stern,  Berserkir  rage  burning 
deep  down  under  all,  and  making  all  to  grow  out  in  the  most 
flourishing  way,  doing  ample  justice  to  all  feelings,  not  devel- 
oping any  one  in  particular."  What  he  writes  is  properly 
nature,  **  the  instinctive  behest  of  his  mind.  This  all-produc- 
ing earth  knows  not  the  symmetry  of  the  oak  which  springs 
from  it.  It  is  all  beautiful,  not  a  branch  is  out  of  its  place,  all 
is  symmetry ;  but  the  earth  has  itself  no  conception  of  it,  and 
produced  it  solely  by  the  virtue  that  was  in  itself."  Shakes- 
peare has  a  beautiful  sympathy  of  brotherhood  with  his  sub- 
ject, but  he  seems  to  have  no  notion  at  all  of  the  great  and 
deep  things  in  him.  Certain  magniloquent  passages  he  seems 
to  have  imagined  extraordinarily  great,  but  in  general  there 
is  perfect  sincerity  in  any  matter  he  undertakes.  It  was  by 
accident  that  he  was  roused  to  be  a  poet,  "  for  the  greatest 
man  is  always  a  quiet  man  by  nature." 

We  turn  from  Shakespeare  to  a  very  different  man— John 
Knox, 

,  ♦  Many  things  said  of  Shakespeare  and  Knox  in  this  lecture  are  repeated  ia  **H«ro 
''aHeroWorSiip."  i—  . 


CARLYLE'S  LECTURES.  3^3 

-  Luther  would  have  been  a  great  man  in  other  things  beside  the  Refonnaticn,  a  great 
substantial  happy  man,  who  must  have  excelled  in  whatever  matter  he  undertook. 
Knox  had  not  that  faculty,  but  simply  this  of  standing  upon  truth  entirely  ;  it  isn't 
that  his  sincerity  is  known  to  him  to  be  sincerity,  but  it  arises  from  a  sense  of  the 
impossibility  of  any  other  procedure.  .  .  .  Sincerity,  what  is  it  but  a  divorce  from 
^arth  and  earthly  feelings  ?  The  sun  which  shines  upon  the  earth,  and  seems  to  touch 
it,  don't  touch  the  earth  at  all.  So  the  man  who  is  free  of  earth  is  the  only  one  that 
can  maintain  the  great  truths  of  existence,  not  by  an  ill-natured  talking  forever  about 
truth,  but  it  is  he  who  does  the  truth.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  humor  in  Knox,  as 
bright  a  humor  as  in  Chaucer,  expressed  in  his  own  quaint  Scotch.  .  .  .  Thus  when 
he  describes  the  two  archbishops  quarreling,  no  doubt  he  was  delighted  to  see  the  dis- 
grace it  brought  on  the  church,  but  he  was  chiefly  excited  by  the  really  ludicrous 
sp^tacle  of  rochets  flying  about,  and  vestments  torn,  and  the  struggle  each  made  to 
overturn  the  other. 

Milton  may  be  considered  "  as  a  summing  up,  composed  as 
it  were  of  the  two,  Shakespeare  and  Knox."*  Shakespeare 
having  reverence  for  everything  that  bears  the  mark  of  the 
Deity,  may  well  be  called  religious,  but  he  is  of  no  particular 
sect.  Milton  is  altogether  sectarian.  As  a  poet  "  he  was  not 
one  of  those  who  reach  into  actual  contact  with  the  deep 
fountains  of  greatness ; "  his  "  Paradise  Lost "  does  not  come 
out  of  the  heart  of  things;  it  seems  rather  to  have  been 
welded  together. 

<  There  is  no  life  in  his  characters.  Adam  and  Eve  are  beautiful,  graceful  objects,  but 
no  one  has  breathed  the  Pygmalion  life  into  them  ;  they  remain  cold  statues.  Milton's 
sympathies  were  with  things  rather  than  .men  ;  the  scenery  and  phenomena  of  nature 
the  gardens,  the  trim  gardens,  the  burning  lake  ;  but  as  for  the  phenomena  of  mind,  he 
was  not  able  to  see  them.  He  has  no  delineation  of  mind  except  Satan,  of  which  we 
may  say  that  Satan  has  his  own  character. 

Lecture  IX.  is  wanting  in  the  manuscript.  The  following 
points  from  the  notice  in  the  Examiner  may  serve  to  preserve 
continuity  in  the  present  sketch.  The  French  as  a  nation 
"  go  together,"  as  the  Italians  do  not ;  but  it  is  physical  and 
animal  going  together,  not  that  of  any  steady,  final  purpose. 
Voltaire,  full  of  wit  and  extraordinary  talents,  but  nothing 
final  in  him.  All  modern  skepticism  is  mere  contradiction, 
discovering  no  new  truth.  Voltaire,  kind-hearted  and  "  be- 
neficent," however.  French  genius  has  produced  nothing 
original.  Montaigne,  an  honest  skeptic.  Excessive  unction 
of  Rabelais's  humor.  Rousseau's  world-influencing  egotism. 
Bayle,  a  dull  writer. 

*  So  Taine^in  \C\%  more  abstract  way,  says  that  Milton  sums  up  th'   '*enaissanoe  ar 
the^ef ormation . 


304.  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Lecture  X. — The  Preach,  as  we  have  seen,  sowed  nothing 
in  the  seedfield  of  time  ;  Voltaire,  on  the  contrary,  casting 
firebrands  among  the  dry  leaves,  produced  the  combustion 
we\shall  notice  by-and-by.  No  province  of  knowledge  was 
cultivated  except  in  an  unfruitful,  desert  way.  Thus  politics 
siimmL^d  themselves  up  in  the  Contrat  Social  of  Rousseau. 
Tht^  sjnly  use  intellect  was  put  to  was  to  ask  why  things  were 
there,  and  to  account  for  it  and  argue  about  it.  So  it  was  all 
over  Europe  in  the  eighteenth  century.  The  quack  was 
established,  and  the  only  belief  held  was  "that  money  will 
buy  money's  worth,  and  that  pleasure  is  pleasant."  In  Eng- 
land this  baneful  spirit  was  not  so  deep  as  in  France  :  partly 
because  the  Teutonic  nature  is  slower,  deeper  than  the 
French  ;  partly  because  England  was  a  free  Protestant  coun- 
try. Still  it  was  an  age  of  logic,  not  of  faith ;  an  age  of  talk, 
striving  to  prove  faith  and  morality  by  speech  ;  unaware  that 
logic  never  proved  any  truths  but  those  of  mathematics,  and 
that  all  great  things  are  silent  things.  "  In  spite  of  early 
training  1  never  do  see  sorites  of  logic  hanging  together,  put 
in  reguliir  order,  but  I  conclude  that  it  is  going  to  end  in  some 
measure  in  some  miserable  delusion." 

However  imperfect  the  literature  of  England  was  at  this 
period,  its  spirit  was  never  greater;  it  did  great  things,  it 
built  great  towns,  Birmingham  and  Liverpool,  Cyclopean 
workshops,  and  ships.  There  was  sincerity  there  at  last, 
Arkwright  and  Watt  were  evidently  sincere.  Another  symp- 
tom of  the  earnestness  of  the  period  was  that  thing  we  call 
Methodism.  The  fire  in  Whitefield — fire,  not  logic — was  une- 
qualed  since  Peter  the  Hermit. 

As  to  literature,  "  in  Queen  Anne's  time,  after  that  most  dis- 
graceful class  of  people — King  Charles's  people — had  passed 
away,  there  appeared  the  milder  kind  of  unbelief,  complete 
formalism.  Yet  there  were  many  beautiful  indications  of 
better  things."  "Addison  was  a  mere  lay  preacher  com- 
pletely bound  up  in  formalism,  but -he  did  get  to  say  many  a 


CARL  YLE  'S  LECTURES.  3^5 

true  thing  in  his  generation."  Steele  had  infinitely  more 
naivete,  but  he  subordinated  himself  to  Addison: 

It  is  a  qold  vote  in  Addison's  favor  that  one  gives.  By  far  the  greatest  man  of  that 
time,  I  think,  was  Jonathan  Swift,  Dean  Swift,  a  man  entirely  deprived  of  his  natural 
nourishment,  but  of  great  robustness,  of  genuine  Saxon  mind,  not  without  a  feeling  of 
reverence,  though  from  circumstances  it  did  not  awaken  him.  .  .  .  He  saw  himself  in 
a  world  of  confusion  and  falsehood  ;  no  eyes  were  clearer  to  see  it  than  his. 

Being  of  acrid  temperament,  he  took  up  what  was  fittest  for 
him,  "  sarcasm  mainly,  and  he  carried  it  quite  to  an  epic  pitch. 
There  is  something  great  and  fearful  in  his  irony  " — which 
yet  shows  sometimes  sympathy  and  a  sort  of  love  for  the 
thing  he  satirizes.  By  nature  he  was  one  of  the  truest  of  men, 
with  great  pity  for  his  fellow  men.     In  Sterne 

there  was  a  great  quantity  of  good  struggling  through  the  superficial  evil.  He  terribly 
failed  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties,  still  we  must  admire  in  him  that  sporting  kind  of 
geniality  and  affection,  a  son  of  our  common  mother,  not  cased  up  in  buckram  formulas. 
...  We  cannot  help  feeling  his  immense  love  for  things  around  him,  so  that  we  may 
say  of  him  as  of  Magdalene,  **  Much  is  forgiven  him  because  he  loved  much." 

As  for  Pope, 

he  was  one  of  the  finest  heads  ever  known,  full  of  deep  saying,  and  uttering  them  in 
the  shape  of  couplets,  rhymed  couplets.* 

The  two  persons  who  exercised  the  most  remarkable  influ- 
ence upon  things  during  the  eighteenth  century  were  unques- 
tionably Samuel  Johnson  t  and  David  Hume,  "two  summits  of 
a  gpreat  set  of  influences,  two  opposite  poles  of  it.  .  .  .  There  is 
not  such  a  cheering  spectacle  in  the  eighteenth  century  as 
Samuel  Johnson."  He  contrived  to  be  devout  in  it ;  he  had  a 
belief  and  held  by  it,  a  genuine  inspired  man.  Hume's  eye, 
junlike  Johnson's,  was  not  opened  to  faith,  yet  he  was  of  a  noble 
perseverance,  a  silent  strength. 

The  History  of  England  failed  to  get  buyers  ;  he  bore  it  all  like  a  Stoic,  like  a  heroic 
silent  man  as  he  was,  and  then  proceeded  calmer  to  the  next  thing  he  had  to  do.  I  have 
heard  old  people,  who  have  remembered  Hume  well,  speak  of  his  great  good  humor 
under  trials,  the  quiet  strength  of  it ;  the  very  converse  in  this  of  Dr.  Johnson,  whose 
coarscnajs  Wtt&  equally  strong  with  his  heroisms. 

*  It  Ls  interesting  to  compare  Thackeray ^s  estimates  of  Swift  xaA  Sterne  with  Car- 
lyle's. 

+  The  criticism  on  Johnson,  being  to  the  same  effect  as  that  of  Carlyle's  essay,  I 
pass  over. 


30i5.  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

As  an  historian,  Hume  "  always  knows  where  to  begin  and 
end.  In  his  History  he  frequently  rises,  though  a  cold  man 
naturally,  into  a  kind  of  epic  height  as  he  proceeds."  His 
skepticism  went  to  the  very  end,  so  that  "all  could  see  what^ 
\v^j;S  \\\  it,  and  gave  up  the  unprofitable  employment  of  spin- 
ning cobwebs  of  logic  in  their  brain."  His  fellow-historian, 
Robertson,  was  a  shallow  man,  with  only  a  power  of  arrange- 
ment and  "  a  soft  sleek  style."  Gibbon,  a  far  greater  historian 
than  Robertson,  was  not  so  great  as  Hume.  "With  all  his 
swagger  and  bombast,  no  man  ever  gave  a  more  futile  account 
of  human  things  than  he  has  done  in  the  *  Dechne  and  Fall 
of  the  Roman  Empire.'" 

Lecture  XI. — It  is  very  strange  to  contrast  Hume,  the 
greatest  of  all  the  writers  of  his  time,  and  in  some  respects  the 
worthiest,  with  Dante;  to  contrast  skepticism  with  faith. 
"  Dante  saw  a  solemn  law  in  the  universe  pointing  out  his 
destiny  with  an  awful  and  beautiful  certainty,  and  he  held  to 
it,  Hume  could  see  nothing  in  the  universe  but  confusion, 
and  he  was  certain  of  nothing  but  his  own  existence.  Yet  he 
had  instincts  which  were  infinitely  more  true  than  the  logical 
part  of  him,  nnd  so  he  kept  himself  quiet  in  the  middle  of  it  all, 
and  did  no  barm  to  any  one."  But  skepticism  is  a  disease  of 
the  mind,  and  a  fatal  condition  to  be  in,  or  at  best  useful  only 
as  a  means  to  get  at  knowledge  ;  and  to  spend  one*s  time  re- 
ducing realities  to  theories  is  to  be  in  an  enchanted  state  of 
mind.  Mortality,  the  very  center  of  the  existence  of  man,  was 
in  the  eighteenth  century  reduced  to  a  theory— by  Adam 
Smith  to  a  theory  of  the  sympathies  and  moral  sense;  by 
Hume  to  e3:pediency,  "the  most  melancholy  theory  ever  pro- 
pounded." Besides  morahty,  everything  else  was  in  the  same 
state. 

A  dlni^  bu^,  iniineasurable  steam-engine  they  had  made  of  this  world,  and,  as  Jean 
Paul  sayt,  heaven  became  a  gas;  God, a  force  ;  the  second  world,  a  grave.  ...  In  that 
huge  itiiiverse  becuinc  one  vast  steam-engine,  as  it  were,  the  new  generation  that  fol- 
lowtd  tfiuaf  h^ve  found  it  a  very  difficult  position  to  be  in,  and  perfectly  insupportable 
£ar  tlicm,  to  be  daomed  to  live  in  such  a  plape  of  falsehood  and  chimera ;  and  that  tras 


CARL  YLE  'S  LECTURES.  307 

in  fact  the  case  with  them,  and  it  led  to  the  second  great  phenomenon  we  have  to 
aotice — the  introduction  of  Wcrtherism.* 

Werther  was  right : —  • 

/  , 

If  the  world  were  really  no  better  than  what  Goethe  imagined  it  to  be,  there  was 
nothing  for  it  but  suicide  ;  if  it  had  nothing  to  support  itself  upon  but  these  poor  senti- 
mentalities, view>hunting  trivialities,  this  world  was  really  not  fit  to  live  in.  But  in 
the  end  the  conviction  that  this  theory  of  the  world  was  wrong  came  to  Goethe  himself, 
greatly  to  his  own  profit,  greatly  to. the  world's  profit. 

The  same  phenomenon  shows  itself  in  Schiller's  "  Robbers." 
Life  to  the  robber  seems  one  huge  bedlam,  and  a  brave  man 
can  do  nothing  with  it  but  revolt  against  it.  In  our  own 
literature  Byron  represents  a  similar  phasis.  He  is  full  of 
"  rage  and  scowl  against  the  whole  universe  as  a  place  not 
worthy  that  a  genuine  man  should  live  in  it.  He  seems  to 
have  been  a  compound  of  the  Robbers  and  Werther  put 
together,"  This  sentimentalism  is  the  ultimatum  of  skep- 
ticism. That  theory  of  the  universe  cannot  be  true ;  for  if 
it  were  there  would  be  no  other  way  for  it  but  Werther's,  to 
put  an  end  to  it;  for  all  mankind  "to  turn  to  the  bosom  of 
their  Father  with  a  sort  of  dumb  protest  against  it.  There 
was,  therefore,  a  deep  sincerity  in  the  sentimentalism,  not  a 
right  kind  of  sincerity  perhaps,  but  still  a  struggling  towards 
it,"t 

All  this  —  skepticism,  sentimentalism,  theorizing,  depen- 
dence on  the  opinion  of  others,  wages  taken  and  no  duty  done — 
went  on  and  on.  And  then  came  the  consummation  of  skep- 
ticism. **  We  can  well  conceive  tlie  end  of  the  iast  century, 
the  crisis  which  then  took  place,  the  prurience  of  self-conceit, 
the  talk  of  illumination,  the  darkness  of  confusion."  The  new 
French  kind  of  belief  was  belief  in  the  doctrine  of  Rousseau, 

♦  A  notice,  far  from  accurate,  of  the  origin  of  Goethe's  Werther  here  follows,  and 
th*  time  is  thus  characterized  by  the  future  historian  of  Frederick :  "  It  was  a  time  of 
haggard  condition ;  no  genuine  hope  in  men's  minds  ;  all  outwards  was  false — ^the  last 
■war  for  example,  the  Seven  Years'  War,  the  most  absurd  of  wars  ever  undertaken,  on 
no  public  principle,  a  contest  between  France  and  Germany,  from  Frederick  the  Great 
granting  to  have  Silesia,  and  Louis  the  Fifteenth  wanting  to  give  Madame  de  Pompa- 
dour some  influence  in  the  affairs  of  Europe  ;  and  50,000  men  were  shot  for  that  pur- 
pose." 
^  t  A  notice  of  **  Goctz  von  Bcrlichingen  "  follows. 


308  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA GAZINE, 

"  a  kind  of  half-madman,  but  of  tender  pity  too,  struggling  for 
^ncerity  through  his  whole  life,  till  his  own  vanity  and  egotism 
drove  him  quite  blind  and  fiesperate."  Then  appeared  one  of 
the  frightfulest  phenomena  ever  seen  among  men,  the  French 
Revolution.  "  It  was  after  all  a  new  revelation  of  an  old  truth 
to  this  unfortunate  people ;  they  beheld,  indeed,  the  truth 
there  clad  in  hell-fire,  but  they  got  the  truth."  It  began  in  all 
the  gol4en  radiance  of  hope ;  it  is  impossible  to  doubt  the 
perfect  sincerity  of  the  men.  At  first  **  for  the  upper  class  of 
people  it  was  the  jbyfulest  of  news ;  now  at  last  they  had  got 

something  to  do certainly  to  starve  to  death  is  hard, 

but  not  so  hard  as  to  idle  to  death." 

But  the  French  theory  of  life  was  false— that  men  are  to  do 
their  duty  in  order  to  give  happiness  to  themselves  and  one 
another.  And  where  dishonest  and  foolish  people  are,  there 
will  always  be  dishonesty  and  folly ;  we  can't  distill  knavery 
into  honesty.  Europe  rose  and  assembled  and  came  round 
France,  and  tried  to  crush  the  Revolution,  but  could  not 
crush  it  it  at  all.  "  It  was  the  primeval  feelings  of  nature 
they  ^ame  to  crush,  but  [the  spirit  of  France]*  rallied,  and 
stood  up  and  asserted  itself,  and  made  Europe  know  even  in 
the  marrow  of  its  bones  that  it  was  there.''  Bonaparte  set  his 
foot  on  the  necks  of  the  nations  of  Europe.  Bonaparte  him- 
self was  a  reality  at  first,  the  great  armed  soldier  of  democracy, 
with  a  true  appreciation  of  the  Revolution,  as  opening  the 
career  to  all  talents ;  but  at  last  he  became  a  poor  egotist,  and, 
stirring  up  the  old  Berserkir  rage  against  him,  he  burned  him- 
self up  in  a  day.  **  On  the  whole,  the  French  Revolution  was 
only  a  great  outburst  of  the  truth  that  the  world  wasn't  a 
mere  chimera,  but  a  great  reality." 

Having  seen  how  skepticism  burned  itself  up,  it  becomes 
interesting  to  inquire  (Lecture  XII.),  What  are  we  to  look  fot 
now  ?  Are  we  to  reckon  on  a  new  period  of  things,  of  better 
infinitely  extending  hopes?    We  do  see  good  in  store  for  us, 


♦  Word  omitted  in  MS. 


d 


CARL  YLE  'S  LECTURES,  3^9 

The  fable  of  the  phoenix  rising  out  of  its  own  ashes,  which  was 
interpreted  by  the  rise  of  modern  Europe  out  of  the  Roman  em- 
pire, is  interpreted  again  in  the  French  Revolution,  On  the 
spiritual  side  of  things  we  can  see  the  phoenix  in  the  modern 
school  of  (rerman  literature.*  We  might  inquire.  What  new 
doctrine  it  is  that  is  now  proposed  to  us  ?  What  is  the  mean- 
ing of  German  literature  ?  But  this  question  is  not  susceptible 
of  any  immediate  answer,  German  literature  has  no  particular 
theory  at  all  in  the  front  of  it.  The  object  of  the  men  who 
constructed  it  was  not  to  save  the  world,  but  to  work  out  in 
some  manner  an  enfranchisement  for  their  own  souls.    And — 

seeing  here  the  blessed,  thrice-blessed  phenomenon  of  men  unmutilated  in  all  that  con- 
stitutes man,  able  to  believe  and  be  in  all  things  men,  seeing  this,  I  say,  there  is  here 
the  ihing  that  has  all  other  thingr  presupposed  in  it.  .  .  .  To  explain,  I  can  only  think 
of  ihe  revelation,  for  I  can  call  it  no  other,  that  these  men  made  to  me.  It  was  to  me 
like  the  rising  of  a  light  in  the  darkness  which  lay  around,  and  threatened  to  swallow 
me  up.  I  was  then  in  the  very  midst  of  Wertherism,  the  blackness  and  darkness  of 
death.  There  was  one  thing  in  particular  struck  me  in  Goethe.  It  is  in  his  Wiihelm 
Meister.  He  had  been  describing  an  association  of  all  sorts  of  people  of  talent,  formed 
to  receive  propositions  and  give  responses  to  them,  all  of  which  he  described  with  a 
sort  of  seriousness  at  first,  but  with  irony  at  the  last.  However,  these  people  had  their 
eyes  on  Wilhelm  Meister,  with  great  cunning,  watching  over  him  at  a  distance  at  first, 
not  interfering  with  him  too  soon  ;  at  last  the  man  who  was  intrusted  with  the  man- 
agement of  the  thing  took  him  in  hand,  and  began  to  give  him  an  account  of  how  the 
association  acted.  Now  this  is  the  thing,  which,  as  I  said,  so  much  struck  me.  He 
tells  Wilhelm  Meister  that  a  number  of  applications  for  advice  were  daily  made  to  the 
association,  which  were  answered  thus  and  thus  ;  but  that  many  people  wrote  in  par- 
ticular for  recipes  of  happiness ;  all  that,  he  adds,  was  laid  on  the  shelf,  and  not 
answered  at  all.  Now  this  thing  gave  me  great  surprise  when  I  read  it.  "  What !  "  I 
said,  *'  is  it  not  the  recipe  of  happiness  that  I  have  been  seeking  all  my  life,  and  isn*t  it 
precisely  because  I  have  failed  in  finding  it  that  I  am  now  miserable  and  discontented  ? 
Had  I  supposed,  as  some  people  do,  that  Goethe  was  fond  of  paradoxes,  that  this  was 
consistent  with  the  sincerity  and  modesty  of  the  man's  mind,  I  had  certainly  rejected 
it  without  further  trouble  ;  but  I  couldn't  think  it.  At  length,  after  turning  it  up,  a 
great  while  in  my  own  mind,  I  got  to  see  that  it  was  very  true  what  he  said — that  it 
was  the  thing  that  all  the  world  were  in  error  in.  No  man  has  a  right  to  ask  for  a 
tecipe  for  happiness  ;  he  can  do  without  happiness ;  there  is  something  better  than 
that.  All  kinds  of  men  who  have  done  great  things — priests,  prophets,  sages — have 
had  in  them  something  higher  than  the  love  of  happiness  to  guide  them,  spiritual  clear- 
•icss  and  perfection,  a  far  better  thing  that  than  happiness.  Love  of  happiness  is  but  a 
Itind  of  hunger  at  the  best,  a  craving  because  I  have  not  enough  of  sweet  provision  in 
this  world.  If  I  am  asked  what  that  higher  thing  is,  I  cannot  at  once  make  answer,  I  am 
afraid  of  causing  mistake.  There  is  no  name  I  can  give  it  that  is  not  to  be  questioned  ; 
I  couldn't  speak  about  it  ;  there  is  no  name  for  it,  but  pity  for  that  heart  that  does  not 

*  Carlyle  is  assured  that  there  are  few  in  his  audience  able  to  read  German,  but 
anticipates  a  better  tinie. 


3  lO  ,  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZINE. 

feel  it ;  there  is  no  good  volition  in  that  heart.  This  higher  thing  was  once  named  the 
Cross  of  Christ — not  a  happy  thing  that,  surely.* 

The  whole  of  German  literature  is  not  to  be  reduced  to  a 
seeking  of  this  higher  thing,  but  such  was  the  commence- 
ment of  it.     The  pliilosophers  of  Germany  are  glanced  at 

1  studied  them  once  attentively,  but  found  that  I  got  nothiagoutgf  thtm.  One  may, 
just  say  of  them  that  they  arc  rht  precisely  opp&iiite  to  Hume.  ,  ,  ,  This  ^tudyof 
metaphysiQ^  I  say^  had  Doly  rht  rci^uEE,  after  hringing  me  rapidly  thru  ugh  diffcre&t 
phases  of  opinion,  at  last  to  deliver  rac  altogether  out  of  mctaphyiiiicis.  [  found  Ji;iko- 
gecher  a  frothy  syiitem,  no  right  beginning  to  it^  no  right  endings  I  began  with  Htimc 
and  Diderot^  and  as  Jong  as  T  was  with  them  \  ran  ai  atheism,  at  blackness,  at  material- 
ism  of  all  kind^.  If  I  t^ad  Kant  J  arrived  at  preci'^ely  opposite  conclusions,  that  all 
the  wotEd  was  spirit,^  namely ^  that  there  wa.-;  n^ihing  material  at  all  anywhere  ;  and  the 
resuk  was  what  I  have  sifted,,  ihat  I  resoived  for  my  part  tin  having  nothing  mate  ti> 
do  with  metaphysics  ai  atl. 

After  the  Werther  period  Goethe  "  got  himself  organized  at 
last,  built  up  his  mind,  adjusted  to  what  he  can't  cure,  not 
suicidally  grinding  itself  to  pieces."  For  a  time  the  ideal,  art, 
painting-,  poetry,  were  in  his  view  the  hig-hest  things,  goodness 
being  inckided  in  these.  God  became  for  him  **  only  a  stub- 
born force,  really  a  heathen  kind  of  thing."  As  his  mind 
gets  higher  it  becomes  more  serious  too,  uttering  tones  of 
most  beautiful  dcvoutnesg.  "  In  the  '  West-ostlicher  Divan,' 
though  the  garb  is  Persian,  the  whole  spirit  is  Christianity,  it. 
is  Goethe  himself,  the  old  poet,  who  goes  \xx^  and  down  sing- 
ing little  snatches  of  his  own  feelings  on  different  things.  It 
grows  ejEtremely  beautiful  as  it  goes  on,  full  of  the  tinest  things 
possible,  which  sound  like  the  jingling  of  bells  when  the  queen 
of  the  fairies  rides  abroad."  t 

Of  Schiller  the  principal  characteristic  is  *'a  chivalry  of- 
thought,  described  by  Goethe  as  the  spirit  of  freedom  strug- 
gling ever  forward  to  be  free/'     His  Don  Carlos 

is  wett  des^^ribcd  as  being  like  to  a  tit^hthouse^  high,  far-seen «  and  withal  empty.  It  is 
in  fact  very  like  what  the  people  of  that  day,  the  Girondists  of  the  French  Kevoluti^je^ 
were  always  talking  about,  the  Roiiheur  du  peiiple  and  the  refit.  .  ,  ,  The«  wai:  anob^ 
ness  in  Schiller,  a  brotherly  feeling,  a  kindti&ss  of  j;ympathy  fnr  what  ii  true  and  jiiit-.. 
There  ii  a  kind  of  sHence  too  Kt  the  last.  He  ji>ave  np  his  talk  ahout  the  BanheurdiiS 
peupk,  and  tried  tg  see  if  he  could  make  them  h^ippier  instead. 

•  Com^parc  with  this  pas&a^  "  the  Everlasting  Yea,"  of  ''  Sartor  Rtsartus." 
t  A  defense  of  Goethe  fmn;  Che  charges  of  over^serenlty  ajid  political  bdiflenftac^ 
foUows. 

\ 


'    WHAT  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL?       ^         311 
The  third  great  writer  in  modern  Germany  is  Richter. 

Goethe  was  a  strong  man,  as  strong  as  the  mountain  rocks,  but  as  soft  as  the  green 
sward  upon  the  rocks,  and  like  them  continually  bright  and  sun  beshone.  Richter,  on 
the  contrary,  was  what  he  has  been  called,  a  half-made  man ;  he  struggled  with  the 
world,  but  was  never  completely  triumphant  over  it.  But  one  loves  Richter.  ..  .  . 
There  is  more  joyous  laughter  in  the  heart  of  Richter  than  in  any  other  German  writer. 

We  have  then  much  reason  to  hope  about  the  future ;  great 
tilings  are  in  store  for  us. 

It  is  possible  for  us  to  attain  a  spiritual  freedom  compared  with  which  political 
enfranchisement  is  but  a  name.  ...  I  can't  close  this  lecture  better  than  by  repeating 
these  words  of  Richter,  "  Thou,  Eternal  Providence,  wilt  cause  the  day  to  dawn." 

Nothing  now  remains  for  me  but  to  take  my  leave  of  you — a  sad  thing  at  all  times 
that  word,  but  doubly  so  in  this  case.  When  I  think  of  what  you  are,  and  of  what  I 
am,  I  cannot  help  feeling  that  you  have  been  kind  to  me ;  I  won't  trust  myself  to  say 
how  kind  ;  but  you  have  been  as  kind  to  me  as  ever  audience  was  to  man,  and  the 
gratitude  which  I  owe  you  comes  to  you  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart.  May  God  be 
with  you  all ! 

Prof.  Edward  Dowden  in  The  Nineteenth  Century. 


WHAT  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL? 

Mizralm  cures  wounds,  and  Pharaoh  is  sold  for  balsams. 

Sir  Thomas  Brownb. 

Death,  like  life,  has  its  history,  and  man  often  terminates 
his  strange  vicissitudes  on  earth  only  to  enter  on  other  vicis- 
situdes still  stranger  in  the  grave.  We  wonder  no  one  has 
ever  undertaken  the  posthumous  memoirs  of  the  great. 
What  a  lively  volume  it  would  be  ! — how  startling  its  paradox- 
es, how  fine  its  irony,  how  pointed  its  antitheses !  Write  it 
with  a  pen  of  lead  on  leaves  of  opium,  and  it  would  glow  with 
eloquence  ;  indite  in  the  most  mournful  of  styles,  and  it  would 
blaze  with  wit.  It  would  be  a  carnival  of  extremes — ^Addison 
and  Joe  Miller  talking  in  the  same  breath,  Rabelais  and  St. 
Paul  bawling  each  other  down.  Fortune  has  cracked  many  a 
good  joke  in  her  time,  but  death's  jokes  are  better.  They  are 
a  little  coarse,  perhaps,  occasionally — a  little  too  broad  for  a 
nice  taste  ;  but  they  are  meant,  doubt  it  not,  kindly.    Wajg^e? 


3 1 2  THE  LI  BRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

are  so  high,  that  we  cannot  well  afford,  even  when  things  are 
prospering  with  us,  to  keep,  like  the  Roman,  consuls,  a  me- 
mentote  mortalem  esse  in  our  triumphal  chariots.  At  our 
feasts  we  omit  the  skeleton.  But  for  all  that  we  are  mortal,, 
and  let  us  hear  the  Antic's  philippics.  We  can  hear  them 
gratis. 

When  Hamlet  let  his  wit  run  riot  among  the  tombs,  he  could 
get  no  further  than  imagining  that  Alexander  the  Great  might 
stop  a  beer-barrel,  or  imperial  Caesar  patch  a  wall  to  keep  out 
the  wind.  Bah  !  'twas  a  foolish  speculation.  Hamlet  was  no 
antiquary ;  he  ought  to  have  known  that  they  were  both  burnt 
to  snuff.  But  why  need  we  go  to  fiction  }  Let  Death  preach 
his  sermon  from  fact,  and  moralists  have  their  fling  at  pride 
fairly.  What  was  the  fate  of  great  Talbot — Shakespeare's 
victorious  Talbot — ^the  scourge  of  France,  the  hero  of  Crotoi 
and  Pontoise  }  A  few  years  ago,  some  alterations  were  being 
made  in  the  parish  church  at  Whitchurch,  in  Shropshire  ;  the 
tomb  of  Talbot  was  opened.  On  a  careful  examination  of  the 
skull — we  borrow  the  narrative  of  one  who  was  present  at  the 
exhumation — the  cranium  was  found  to  be  filled  with  a  fibrous 
substance,  which  was  supposed  at  first  to  be  some  preservative 
herb  inserted  when  the  bones  were  wrapped  in  their  cerements 
for  the  purpose  of  embalming,  but  which  afterwards  turned 
out  to  be  neither  more  nor  less  than  a  mouse's  nest,  from  the 
center  of  which  the  bodies  of  three  small  mice  were  extracted. 
In  short,  the  brain  of  the  doughty  general  who  had  struck 
terror  into  the  squadrons  of  Joan  of  Arc  had  become  the  pro- 
creant  cradle  of  a  family  of  church  mice,  and  the  fatal  gash 
which  had  terminated  his  life,  furnished  the  means  of  ingress 
and  egress  to  these  strange  intruders  in  "  ambition's  airy  hall." 
What  was  the  fate  of  Richelieu  ?  His  skeleton  was  dug  up 
from  its  grave  in  the  church  of  the  Sorbonne,  kicked  about 
the  streets,  and  decapitated.  A  grocer — mark  that ! — filched 
away  the  skull,  kept  it  comfortably  till  his  marriage,  when, 
his  wife  being  afraid  of  it,  sold  it — ^the  considerate  husband  I — 


WHA  T  BECAME  OF  CROM  WELL  ?  3^3 

to  one  Armez,  who,  anxious  to  turn  it  into  money,  offered  it 
for  sale  to  the  Due  de  Richeliei^,  who  wouldn't  have  it  at  any 
price.  What  was  the  fate  of  Turenne — "  the  godlike,"  "  the 
thunderbolt  of  war  "  ?  His  remains  were  also  exhumed,  and 
were  on  the  point  of  being  flung  into  a  pit,  when  a  savant, 
struck  with  the  fresh  appearance  of  the  bones,  and  thinking 
that  the  devastator  of  the  Palatinate  was  too  perfectly  articu- 
lated to  be  thrown  away,  begged  the  skeleton  for  the  National 
Academy  of  Anatomy.  So  he,  who  in  life  taught  Marl- 
borough the  art  of  war,  served  in  death  to  teach  medical 
scapegraces  the  construction  of  the  human  frame.  Was  not 
the  author  of  "  Paradise  Lost "  dismembered  by  a  crew  of 
drunken  revelers,  "  one  possessing  himself  of  a  piece  of  the 
jaw,  another  of  a  fragment  of  the  occiput  "  ?  Did  not  a  '*  se- 
lect body  of  medical  gentlemen,"  with  the  skull  of  the  mighty 
Dean  of  St.  Patrick's  grinning  before  them  on  the  table, 
express  "  very  lively  dissatisfaction  at  its  formation  "  ?  And 
is  there  not  "  only  too  much  reason  to  believe  "  that  the  head 
of  him  who  gave  us  the  "  Essay  on  Man  "  and  the  "  Rape  of 
the  Lock  "  has  been  traveling  about  England  in  the  pos- 
session of  an  "  itinerant  phrenologist  "  }  Food  enough  for 
reflection  here  ! — and  would  you,  reader,  find  food  for  more, 
go  and  moralize  whither  we  could  lead  you.  In  the  heart  of 
the  city,  girt  round  with  squalor,  stands,  mean  and  somber,  a 
little  church.*  There  you  may  hold  in  your  hand  the  head  of 
him  who  was  once  the  father  of  Lady  Jane  Grey,  once  one  of 
the  proudest  of  England's  proudest  nobles.  There,  perfectly 
preserved,  is  the  head  of  Henry,  Duke  of  Suffolk.  The  lines 
which  the  cares  of  three  centuries  and  a  half  ago  plowed  on 
the  features  may  still  be  traced  ;  still  may  the  physiognomist 
read  the  lineaments  of  that  austere,  stubborn,  and  crafty 
politician.  The  dent  of  the  false  blow  which  the  headsman 
first  dealt  is  there  in  all  its  ghastly  distinctness ;  and  there, 

*  The  church  of  Holy  Trinity  in  the  Minories. 


314  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

frightfully  stereotyped,  is  the  death-^ony  which  convulsed 
ihat  face  when  the  headsman's  work  was  done.  Those  were 
the  eyes — the  very  cornea  are  preserved — which  had  g^zed  on 
Jane  as  she  hung  with  Ascham  over  the  Phaedo. 

But  whither  are  we  straying?  Our  business  is  a  grave 
antiquarian  dissertation. 

What  became  of  Cromwell's  body  after  death  ?  has,  as  every- 
body knows,  been  a  vexed  question  from  the  times  of  the 
Restoration  to  the  present  day  ;  and,  as  wp  are  not  acquainted 
with  any  satisfactory  solution  of  the  problem,  we  propose  to 
devote  a  few  pages  to  discussing  it.  The  question  will  admit 
of  three  distinct  divisions.  Firstly,  was  he  ever  buried  in 
Westminster  Abbey  at  all  ?  Secondly,  if  he  was  buried  there 
what  became  of  his  body  when  it  was  exhumed  and  conveyed 
to  the  Red  Lion  Inn,  in  Holborn  }  Thirdly,  if  it  ever  left  the 
Red  Lion  Inn,  what  became  of  it  after  hanging  at  Tyburn  ? 

Now,  there  can  be  no  doubt  at  all  that  there  was  a  very  gen- 
eral impression  that  his  body  never  left  Whitehall  for  Somer- 
set House  ;  that  its  supposed  lying-in-state  at  Somerset  House 
and  its  subsequent  interment  in  the  Abbey  was  a  mere  mock- 
ery. Let  us  examine  the  facts..  Cromtvell  died  on  Friday, 
September  3,  at  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  He  was  then 
embalmed.  That  is  certain.  "  This  afternoon,"  says  the  Pub- 
lic Intelligencer  for  September  4,  1658,  "  the  physicians  and 
cherugians  apj>ointed  by  order  of  the  council  to  embowel  and 
embalm  the  body  of  his  late  highness,  and  fill  the  same  with 
sweet  odors,  performed  their  duty."  All  the  authorities,  with- 
out a  single  exception,  agree  that  he  was  embalmed ;  but 
Heath  observes,  in  his  "  Flagellum,"  that  the  body  was  in  such 
a  state  that  the  embalming  was  only  partially  performed,  and 
Noble  tells  us  that  it  was  wrapped  up  in  a  sheet  of  lead ;  con- 
sequently it  was  not  exposed  to  view  for  long  after  death — ^a 
circumstance  which  the  Public  Intelligencer  also  notices.  It 
remained,  or  was  supposed  to  remain,  at  Whitehall  till  the 
twenty-sixth  of  September,  when  it  was  conveyed,  "  about  ten 


WHk  T  Became' OF  cromwell?  3 ^ 5 

of  the  clock  at  night,"  to  Somerset  House.  There  it  lay  in 
state,  and  was  shortly  afterwards  interred  in  Westminster 
Abbey.  Now,  it  is  noticeable  that,  after  a  few  hours  subse- 
quent to  death,  the  corpse  itself  was  never  seen.  And  here 
begin  our  difficulties.  Most  of  the  authorities  agree  in  stating 
that  the  body  was  privately  interred  shortly  after  death  ;  con- 
sequently the  alleged  removal  to  Somerset  House  was  a  decep- 
tion. This  indeed,  is  all  but  certain  ;  for  besides  the  evidence 
of  Heath,  who  says  that  an  empty  coffin  was  dispatched  to 
Somerset  House, — evidence  which  is  not  of  v^xy  much  value, 
we  have  the  evidence  of  Bates,  Cromwell's  private  physician, 
that  the  state  of  the  body  necessitated  its  interment  before  the 
solemnity  of  the  funeral.  And  such  also  is  the  account  of 
Noble.  We  may,  therefore,  safely  conclude  that  the  magnifi- 
cent funeral  of  Cromwell,  on  which  Cowley  expended  so  much 
eloquence,  was  a  mock  pageant,  though  the  crowd  which 
witnessed  it  had  no  such  suspicion.  And  now  comes  the 
question.  Where  was  he  interred  ? 

Heath,  whose  political  prejudices  frequently  get  the  better 
of  his  reason,  complacently  informs  his  readers  that  "  divers 
rumors  were  spread  at  the  time  that  the  body  was  carried 
away  in  the  tempest  the  day  before  by  the  prince  of  dark- 
ness," and  is  evidently  nettled  that  he  cannot  prove  this  satis- 
factory theory.  According  to  Oldmixon,  his  body  was  wrapped 
in  lead  and  "  sunk  in  the  deepest  part  of  the  Thames,  two  of 
his  near  relations  undertaking  to  do  it ;"  and  an  anonymous 
pamphleteer  adds,  that  it  was  just  below  Greenwich.  A  com- 
mon opinion  at  the  Restoration  was  that  the  corpse  was  taken 
to  Windsor  and  put  into  King  Charles's  coffin,  while  that  of 
the  murdered  king  was  substituted  for  Cromwell's  ;  Cromwell, 
they  said,  knowing  that,  if  a  reaction  set  in  after  his  death,  in 
favor  of  the  Stuarts,  his  body  would  be  dug  up  and  insulted. 
This  theory  was,  however,  refuted  by  the  exhumation  of 
Charles  I.  in  the  presence  of  George  IV.  and  Sir  Henry  Hal- 
ford  in  1 81 3, — having  had*  indeed,  no  evidence  to  support  it. 


3 16  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MAGAZINE, 

Others  say  that  his  body  was  removed  to  Newburgh  Hall,  in 
the  North  Riding  of  Yorkshire ;  and  there  they  still  show  a  place 
called  Cromwell's  Vault.  Newburgh  Hall  was  the  family  seat 
of  the  Fauconbergs,  and  Cromwell's  third  daughter,  Mary,  was 
the  second  wife  of  Thomas,  Viscount  Fauconberg ;  but  why 
this  place  should  have  been  particularly  selected  for  the  inter- 
ment of  the  Protector  does  not  appear.  According  to  another 
tradition,  it  was  removed  to  Narborough,  a  place  about  twen- 
ty-five miles  from  Huntingdon,  and  for  this  tradition  there  is 
some  evidence  worth  reviewing.  About  the  year  1818  the 
rector  of  Narborough  was  a  Mr.  William  Marshall.  To  this 
Mr.  Marshall  a  very  curious  anecdote  was  communicated  by 
Mr.  Oliver  Cromwell,  of  Cheshunt,  the  great-grandson  of 
Richard  Cromwell's  son,  Henry.  Mr.  Oliver  Cromwell's 
mother  lived  to  the  great  age  of  103,  and  she  told  her  son  that 
when  a  young  girl  she  was  well  acquainted  with  Richard 
Cromwell,  and  had  often  talked  with  one  of  his  servants^  This 
servant  assured  her,  she  said,  that  he  recollected  the  hearse 
which  conveyed  the  remains  of  the  Protector  passing  through 
Cheshunt  at  night,  and  that  he,  then  a  lad,  went  on  with  the 
post-horses  which  drew  the  hearse  as  far  as  Huntingdon, 
whence  he  was  sent  back  with  the  horses.  This  story  must, 
of  course,  be  taken  for  What  it  is  worth.  It  is  just  possible 
(but  it  is  by  no  means  probable),  that  Cromwell,  fearing  post- 
humous outrage,  may  have  wished  to  lie  beside  his  parents  in 
the  family  grave.  There,  were  his  resting-place  unsuspected, 
he  would  at  least  be  safe  from^  sacrilegious  hands.  But,  would 
such  a  secret  have  been  likely  to  have  been  kept  }  and  how 
came  a  mere  boy  to  know  what  that  hearse  contained  ?  A 
secret  divulged  thus  far  would  undoubtedly  have  gone  further, 
and  it  is  certain  that  no  tradition  about  the  Protector's  inter- 
ment at  Huntingdon  was  current  at  the  time.  The  story  that 
it  was  buried  at  Narborough,  a  town  twenty-five  miles  beyond 
Huntingdon,  is  a  legend  so  utterly  devoid  of  foundation  that 
it  would  be  absurd  to  pay  the  slightest  attention  to  it.  It-  is 
ndeed  difficult  to  account  for  its  origin. 


IV//A  T  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL  ?'  3 1 7 

We  are  now  come  to  a  very  remarkable  narrative ;  and 
could  we  be  satisfied  of  the  veracity  of  the  witness,  and  allow 
his  solemn  assurances  to  weigh  against  the  intrinsic  improba- 
bility of  his  statement,  the  problem  of  Cromwell's  last  resting- 
place  would  be  solved.  Among  the  reports'  current  at-  the 
Restoration,  one  of  the  most  popular  was  that  the  body  of  the 
Protector  had  been,  by  his  own  orders,  buried  on  the  field 
of  Naseby.  This  report  took  several  forms.  The  truth  of  it 
was  confidently  insisted  on  in  London,  and  was  implicitly  be- 
lieved by  the  people  about  Naseby.  At  last  the  son  of  Bark- 
stead,  the  regicide,  came  forward.  He  was,  he  said,  prepared 
to  assert  on  oath  the  truth  of  what  he  said.  He  put  forth  an 
advertisement  that  he  frequented  Richard's  Coffee-house, 
within  Temple  Bar,  where  he  was  ready  to  answer  any  ques- 
tions which  might  be  put  to  him.  The  account  he  gave  is  to 
be  found  in  the  second  volume  of  the  "  Harleian  Miscellany," 
and  this  account  we  will  transcribe  : 

"  At  midnight  the  dead  body,  being  first  embalmed  and 
wrapped  in  a  leaden  coffin,  was  in  a  hearse  conveyed  to  the 
said  field,  Mr.  Barkstead  himself  attending,  by  order  of  his 
father,  close  to  the  hearse.  That  being  come  to  the  field, 
they  found  about  the  middle  of  it  a  grave  dug  about  nine  feet 
deep,  with  the  green  sod  carefully  laid  on  one  side,  and  the 
mound  on  the  other,  in  which  the  coffin  being  put  the  grave 
was  instantly  filled  up  and  the  green  sod  laid  exactly  flat  upon 
it,  care  being  taken  that  the  surplus  mold  should  be  clear 
removed.  That  soon  after  the  like  care  was  taken  that  the 
ground  should  be  plowed  up,  and  that  it  was  sowed  succes- 
sively with  corn." 

Here,  then,  we  have  a  definite  statement,  made  by  a  man  in 
a  highly  respectable  position,  who  could  have  had  no  conceiv- 
able motive  for  lying.  Those  who  had  the  opportunity  of 
cross-examining  him  appear  to  have  been  satisfied  of  his  hon- 
esty, and  he  was  not,  so  far  as  we  can  judge  of  him,  a  man 
given  either  to  frivolity  or  romancing.   To  disbelieve  his  story 


3l8  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,    , 

V 

is  to  charge  the  narrator  with  deliberate  and  circumstantial 
falsehood.  We  are  certainly  not  inclined  to  accept  this  state- 
ment without  much  misgiving,  but  we  think  it  within  the 
bounds  !  A  possibility  that  the  plow  of  the  peasant  may  some 
day  ci:>rroborate  the  honesty  of  this  strange  deponent.  We 
shall  see  presently  that  the  evidence  for  the  identification  of 
the  body  at  its  disinterment  rests  on  testimony  far  less  con- 
clusive ;  nnd  we  may  also  observe,  in  comparing  the  story 
with  the  others,  that  Barkstead  is  the  only  witness  who  could 
not  have  been  mistaken,  but  who  must  have  lied.  The  evi- 
dence of  the  others  is  based  on  information  more  or  less 
indirect  and  presumptive ;  the  evidence  of  Barkstead  is  direct 
and  definite.  Now,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  for  some 
months  before  his  death  the  mind  of  the  Protector  was  un- 
hing-ed  and  morbid,  that  he  anticipated  a  reaction  in  favor 
of  the  exiled  house  ;  and  he  must  have  been  well  aware  that 
in  the  event  of  the  Stuarts  returning,  his  bones  would  not 
escape  insult.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  his  body  was 
buried  somewhere  in  the  strictest  privacy  long  before  the 
public  funeral.  It  is  equally  certain  that  we  have  no  account 
either  of  the  date  or  of  the  spot  where  that  private  interment 
took  place,  and  that  the  secret  must  have  been  known  only 
to  very  few,  for  there  was  at  the  time  no  suspicion  that  the 
public  funeral  was  a  mock  ceremony.  Wherever,  therefore, 
the  remams  were  laid,  they  were  smuggled  away,  and  it  was 
of  course  as  easy  to  transfer  them  in  a  hearse'  or  a  carriage  to 
any  p^rt  of  England,  as  it  was  to  bury  them  secretly  in  the 
Abbey.  If  we  are  to  be  guided  merely  by  probabilities,  we 
should  of  course  reject  all  the  narratives  which  have  been 
cited »  and  conclude  that  the  Protector  was  laid  privately 
under  the  pavement  of  Westminster  Abbey  at  or  near  the 
p!ace  where  the  empty  coffin  was  lowered  on  the  day  of  the 
public  funeral.  To  sum  up,  therefore,  the  first  part  of  our 
inquiry^  whether  Cromwell  was  actually  interred  in  the  Abbey- 
is  at  least  doubtful ;  tK^  presumptive  evidence  is  strong,  but 


JVJ/A  T  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL  f  3 1^ 

it  is  by  no  means  either  conclusive  or  satisfactory.  It  is  sup- 
ported by  the  testimony  of  no  eye-witness.  It  is  affirmed  only 
by  those  who  supposed  that  the  coffin  which  was  on  the  day 
of  the  public  funeral  lowered  into  the  vault  contained  the 
body  of  the  Protector ;  ^'when  we  now  know,  on  the  testimony 
of  Dr.  Bates,  that  the  body  had  been  buried  privately  long 
before. 

And  now  let  us  proceed.  On  the  8th  of  December,  1660,  a 
vote  passed  the  House  of  Commons  that  the  bodies  of  Crom- 
well, Ireton,*and  Bradshaw,  should  be  exhumed,  and  hung  on 
the  common  gallows  at  Tyburn.  Accordingly,  on  Saturday, 
January  26th,  the  sergeant  of  the  House  of  Commons  pro- 
ceeded to  the  Abbey  with  a  body  pf  attendants.  The  masons 
w^nt  to  work,  and  of  what  ensued  we  have  two  accounts, 
neither  of  which  is  of  such  a  character  as  to  place  it  beyond 
suspicion.  Both  of  them,  it  will  be  observed,  describe  the 
body  as  lying  in  the  state  coffin  which  was  deposited  in  the 
vault  on  the  day  of  the  public  funeral — ^the  coffin  which  we 
now  know  to  have  been  merely  for  show,  and  never  to  have 
contained  the  body  at  all.     Let^s  hear  Noble  : — 

"  They  found,  in  a  vault  at  the  east  end  of  the  middle  aisle, 
a  magnificent  coffin,  which  contained  the  body  of  Oliver,  upon 
whose  breast  was  a  copper  plate,  double  gilt,  which  upon  one 
side  had  the  arms  of  the  Commonwealth  impaling  those  of  the 
deceased,  and  upon  the  reverse  this  inscription."  Then  fol- 
lows the  Latin  inscription  which  was  on  the  coffin  that  lay  in 
state  at  Somerset  House. 

The  other  account  was  handed  down  by  tradition  from  the 
high  sheriff  of  Middlesex,  who  superintended  the  work.  He 
found,  he  said,  the  body  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  which  was  hid  in 
the  wall  of  Westminster  Abbey,  "  and,  when  discovered,  was 
with  great  difficulty  got  at,  the  body  being  first  wrapped  in  a 
sheet  of  lead,  and  afterwards  put  into  a  wooden  coffin,  and  an- 
other wooden  one,  and  so  on  for  about  half  a  dozen,  cement 
being  poured  between  each  to  make  it  secure  ;  several  pick- 


320  THE  UBRAR  Y  MA  GAZJNE. 

axes  were  broken  before  the  workmen  coiHd  get  their  ends; 
but  at  length,  after  much  labor  and  toil,  they  came  to  the 
sheet  of  lead  which  inclosed  the  body."  There  is,  however, 
one  piece  of  evidence  not  without  weight,  and  that  is  the 
evidence  of  one  Sainthill,  a  Spanish  merchant,  who  has,  in  a 
manuscript  quoted  by  Noble,  observed  that  the  head  of  the 
Protector  was  "  in  green  cerecloth,  very  fresh  embalmed," 
which  certainly  corroborates  what  we  know  from  other 
sources,  that  the  body  was  partially  embalmed.  The  mason's 
receipts  for  the  fees  received  by  him  for  his  odious  task  is, 
we  believe,  still  in  existence.  Is  this,  then,  sufficient  evi- 
dence to  satisfy  us  that  the  body  thus  exhumed  was  the  body 
of  Cromwell  ?  We  say  emphatically,  no.  In  the  first  place, 
there  is  the  difficulty  about  the  cofTm.  In  the  second  plac^, 
we  have  no  official  corroboration  of  this  narrative.  It  was 
very  much  against  the  interests  of  those  employed  in  this 
work  to  confess  themselves  baffled  ;  it  was  much  more  likely 
that  they  would,  in  the  event  of  their  not  discovering  the  ob- 
ject of  their  search,  have  substituted  some  other  body  in  its 
place.  If  Cromwell  was  not  buried  in  the  state  coffin — ^and 
unless  he  was  placed  there  subsequently  to  his  previous  inter- 
ment, he  was  not — it  would  be  extremely  difficult  to  identify 
his  remains.  It  is,  indeed,  true  that  when  the  body  was  ex- 
posed, it  was  popularly  supposed  to  be  that  of  the  Protector ; 
but  with  regard  to  the  skull,  we  must  remember  that  it  was 
invariably  covered  with  a  thick  coating  of  pitch  before  it  was 
exposed  ;  and  had  the  exhuming  party  been  conscious  of  any 
fraud,  they  would  obviously  have  taken  every  precaution  to 
conceal  it.  But  however  this  may  be,  certain  it  is  that  some 
corpse,  genuine  or  suppositious,  was,  with  those  of  Ireton  and 
Bradshaw,  conveyed  from  the  Abbey  to  the  Red  Lion  inn, 
in  Holborn.  This  was  on  Monday,  January  2oth ;  where  it 
remained  during  the  Sunday  does  not  appear.  Assuming,  then, 
that  the  corpse  of  Cromwell  was  really  conveyed  to  the  Red 
Lion,  the  question  now  arises,  did  it  ever  leave  the  Red  Lion 


L\ 


WHA  T  BECAME  OF  CROM  WELL  ?  321 

for  Tyburn,  or  was  some  other  corpse  substituted  in  its 'place 
by  Cromwell's  partisans?  It  is,  of  course,  quite  conceivable 
that  the  officers  in  charge  of  the  remains  might  have  been 
amenable  to  a  bribe ;  and  it  is  very  probable  that  such  an 
attempt  was  made. 

It  was  made,  we  are  told,  and  not  only  made,  but  carried 
out,  by  a  person  named  Ebenezer  Heathcote,  an  apothecary 
in  Red  Lion  Square.  This  man  was  a  zealous  republican,  and 
had  married  the  daughter  of  one  of  Ireton's  commissaries. 
The  tale  goes  that  he  gained  access  to  those  who  kept  watch 
ovei  the  corpse, — who  appear,  we  may  add,  to  have  been  a 
drunken  and  dissolute  set,— got  possession  of  the  body, 
smuggled  it  away,  and  buried  it  privately  at  midnight  in  the 
center  of  Red  Lion  Square,  then  as  now  an  open  space,  the 
exact  spot  of  the  interment  being  just  under  the  place  at 
present  occupied  by  the  summer-house.  This  strange  story, 
in  itself  less  improbable  than  any  of  the  others,  unfortunately 
rests  on  no  good  authority.  We  find  no  mention  of  it  in  any 
contemporary  documents ;  it  appears  to  have  been  dissemi- 
nated in  much  later  times :  a  circumstance  which  its  advocates 
might  of  course  attribute  to  the  fidelity  with  which  the  secret 
was  preserved.  It  would  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  con- 
fute it,  and  it  contributes  to  perplex  still  further  this  myste- 
rious historical  enigma. 

Now  let  us  bring  forward  the  evidence  for  the  conveyance 
of  the  bodies  to  Tyburn.  The  most  graphic  and  circumstantial 
account  is  undoubtedly  that  given  in  the  "  Mercurius  Po- 
liticus  "  for  January  30,  1660.  "  On  Monday  night,  Cromwell, 
Bradshaw,  and  Ireton,  in  two  several  carts,  were  drawn  to 
Holbom  from  Westminster,  where  they  were  digged  up  on 
Saturday  last.  To-day  they  were  drawn  upon  sledges  to 
Tyburn ;  all  the  way,  as  before  from  Westminster,  the  uni- 
versal outcry  and  curses  of  the  people  went  along  with 
them;  When  these  three  carcases  were  at  Tyburn,  they  were 
pulled  out  of  their  coffins  and  hanged  at  the  several  angles  of 
L.  M.— 1 1 


322  THE  LIRRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

that  triple  tree,  where  they  hung  till  the  sun  was  set.  After 
which  they  were  taken  down,  their  heads  cut  off,  and  their 
loathsome  trunks  thrown  into  a  deep  hole  under  the  gallows. 
The  heads  of  those  three  notorious  regicides,  Oliver  Cromwell, 
John  Bradshaw,  and  Henry  Ireton  were  set  upon  poles  at  the 
top  of  Westminster  Hall."  To  this  effect,  also,  the  author  of 
"  Short  Meditations  on  Oliver  Cromwell :  "  "  But  the  corpse 
of  him  whose  aspiring  mind  could  never  be  satisfied,  hath  now 
no  other  tomb  but  a  turf  under  Tyburn."  Among  those  who 
witnessed  this  shameful  spectacle  were  good  Mrs.  Pepys  and 
her  friend  Lady  Batten,  as  we  learn  from  Pepys's  Diar);  for 
January  30.  Such,  according  to  general  opinion,  was  the  ig- 
nominious resting-place  of  the  body  of  Cromwell.  And  here 
for  a  moment  we  may  pause  to  notice  the  absence  of  all  con- 
clusive proof  of  identification.  The  whole  business  seems  to 
have  been  transacted  with  incredible  carelessness  and  irregu- 
larity. Of  the  character  of  the  people  to  whose  guardianship 
the  remains  were  intrusted  we  have  already  spoken.  Official 
testimony  there  is  none,  medical  testimony  there  is  none. 
The  identification  of  a  corpse  is,  as  every  coroner  knows, 
often  a  matter  of  considerable  difficulty,  even  under  the  most 
favorable  circumstances.  The  identification  of  a  corpse  two 
years  after  its  interment,  even  when  decomposition  has  been 
arrested,  requires  nice  technical  discrimination.  It  was,  as  we 
said  before,  the  object  of  the  exhuming  party  to  persuade 
their  employers  that  Cromwell's  body  had  been  found.  It 
would  not.  indeed,  be  too  much  to  presume  that,  in  the  event 
of  a  search  being  unsuccessful,  the  royalists  would  them- 
selves have  connived  at  fraud.  Their  object  was,  not  merely 
to  insult  the  memory  of  an  adversary,  but  to  brand  with 
infamy  the  memory  of  rebellion,  to  give  the  people  a  terrible 
warning  by  a  terrible  example.  Would  a  drunken  and  turbu- 
lent rabble  be  likely  to  be  critical  ?  Who  is  curious  when  on 
fire  with  passion  ?  and  what  passion  burns  more  fiercely  than 
party  passion  in  a  mob  ?     Had  a  doubt  crossed  the  mind,  who 


IVIIA  T  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL?  3^3 

would  have  cared  or  dared  to  express  it  ?  A  sordid  rout  on 
its  way  to  have  a  kick  at  Sejanus  is  neither  scrupulous  nor 
observant.  There  were,  we  know,  many  people  whe  con- 
fidently believed  that  the  body  which  swung  on  the  gibbet  at 
Tyburn  was  not  the  body  of  the  Protector;  and  as  soon  as  it 
was  safe  to  express  their  belief,  they  expressed  it.  When 
Barkstead  came  forward  with  his  strange  story,  the  witness 
which  might  have  confuted  him  was  still  festering  on  the 
spikes  at  Westminster.  There  were  many  people  living  who 
could  have  placed  it  beyond  doubt  that  the  head  there  was 
the  head  of  the  Protector,  but  they  were  silent.  Again,  is  it 
incredible  that  the  sons  and  daughters  of  Cromwell,  who  were, 
we  know,  devotedly  attached  to  him,  would  have  allowed  the 
head  of  their  father  to  remain  jibbeted  for  twenty-five  years, 
without  making  any  effort  to  rescue  it  ?  It  is  surely  more 
natural  to  attribute  their  indifference  to  the  fact  that  they 
knew  it  was  not  there.  We  have  not  ventured  to  express 
our  belief  in  any  of  the  stories  we  have  cited  touching  the 
burial-places  of  the  Protector,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  at  all 
that  there  has. been,  among  the  various  branches  of  the  Crom- 
well family,  a  tradition  to  the  effect  that  he  was  never  buried  in 
the  Abbey.  He  may  possibly  have  bound  his  wife,  his  children, 
and  the  friends  whom  it  was  necessary  to  take  into  his  con- 
fidence, to  secrecy.  That  secret  has  probably  never  been 
divulged,  though  the  depositaries  of  it  may  at  the  painful 
crisis  of  1660  have  thought  themselves  justified  in  assuring 
his  relatives  that  his  body  was  safe  from  sacrilegious  hands, 
and  beyond  possibility  of  outrage.  This  would  account,  not 
only  for  the  existence  of  the  tradition,  but  for  the  various 
discrepancies  in  detail ;  and  it  would  account,  above  all,  for 
the  apathy  of  his  kindred  subsequent  to  the  exhumation. 

We  will  now  resume  our  narrative — a  narrative  to  which, 
from  this  point,  as  will  be  seen  from  what  we  have  just  said, 
we  are  not  inclined  to  attach  much  credit.  The  bodies,  we 
are  told,  hung^  a  whole  day ;  they  were  then  cut  down  and 


324  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

decapitated.  The  trunks  were  buried  at  the  foot  of  the  gal- 
lows ;  the  heads,  or  rather  the  skulls,  were  covered  with  pitch, 
stuck  on  poles,  and  conveyed  to  Westminster  Hall.  They 
were  there  fixed  in  a  ghastly  row.  "  Went  into  the  hall,  and 
there  saw  my  Lord  Treasurer  ....  and  also  saw  the  heads  of 
Cromwell,  Bradshaw,  and  Ireton,"  Pepys  enters  in  his  diary 
February  5^  1661.  Here,  by  the  v/ay,  we  have  a  curious  piece 
of  evidence  to  deal  with.  We  have  already  npticed  Sainthill's 
remark  about  Cromwell's  head  being  "  very  fresh  embalmed." 
He  sa^v  thtf  skull,  it  seems,  on  the  spikes  at  Westminster,  and 
the  fact  that  it  was  an  embalmed  skull  seems  at  first  to  be 
strong^  evidence  in  favor  of  that  skull  being  the  skull  of 
Croniweii.  The  statement  is,  however,  difficult  to  reconcile, 
first,  with  the  fact  that  the  skulls  were  plastered  with  pitch  ; 
and,  secondly,  that  the  head  of  Cromwell  was  so  disfigured 
that  many  took  it  for  the  head  of  Charles  the  First.  Had  it 
been  fresh  embalmed,  it  is  singular  that  no  other  spectator 
should  have  noticed  the  circumstance,  and  no  other  spectator 
has  noticed  it.  It  is  clear^lso  that  Sainthlll  could  never  have 
been  near  enough  to  inspect  it  closely,  unless,  indeed,  he  had 
an  opportunity  of  examining  it  previous  to  its  impalement ; 
and  this  does  not  appear  to  have  been  the  case.  Granting 
even  that  it  was  so,  the  embalming  had  not  sufficiently  pre- 
served the  head  to  establish  its  identity,  or  even  to  distin- 
guish it  conspicuously  from  the  other  two  heads.  Cromwell 
was  partially  embalmed,  but  embalming  was  in  those  days  not 
uncommonly  employed  even  in  the  case  of  ordinary  people, 
and  such  a  circumstance  would  by  no  means  suffice  to  estab- 
lish the  identity  of  the  skull.  It  should,  moreover,  be  borne 
in  mind  that  Dr.  Bates,  in  his  autopsy,  says  nothing  about  the 
head  beiny;  embalmed.  lie  merely  says  that  the  entrails  were 
removed  and  the  cavity  stulled  with  spices.  Taking  all  these 
facts  into  consideration,  we  must  therefore  honestly  say  that 
we  see  no  proof  whatever  that  the  body  decapitated  at  Tyburn 
was  the  body  of  the  Protector,  or  that  the  skull  impaled  at. 
Westminster  was  his  skull. 


WHAT  BECAME  OF  CROMWELL?  3^5 

We  must  now  quit  history  for  tradition,  and  fojlow  the  for- 
tunes of  "  Cromwell's  skull  "  to  our  own  day.  Since  the  year 
i8r3  it  has  been  in  the  possession  of  a  family  named  Wilkin- 
son. It  was,  says  a  writer  in  "  Notes  and  Queries,"  carefully 
examined  by  Flaxman,  who  did  not  hesitate  to  pronounce  it 
genuine,  and  by  the  eminent  antiquary  King,  who  was  equally 
satisfied  of  its  authenticity.  That  Mr.  Wilkinson's  interest- 
ing relic  has  been  partially  embalmed,  that  it  has  been  impaled 
on  a  spike  and  exposed  to  the  weather,  that  in  many  partic- 
ulars it  closely  corresponds  with  those  peculiarities  in  the 
formation  of  the  Protector's  head  preserved  to  us  in  busts, 
portraits,  and  medals,  is  unquestionably  true.  It  is  true,  also, 
that  up  to  a  certain  point  its  pedigree  is  satisfactory — but  up 
to  a  certain  point  only.     What,  then,  is  its  history? 

The  story  goes  that,  on  a  stormy  night  at  the  end  of  James 
the  Second's  reign,  it  was  blown  down.  The  sentinel  on  duty 
picked  it  up,  concealed  it,  and  conveyed  it  home  with  him. 
It  was,  however,  soon  missed,  and  a  proclamation  demanding 
its  immediate  restoration  was  at  once  issued  by  the  govern- 
ment. The  soldier  and  his  family  kept  it,  therefore,  care- 
fully hidden.  Some  j'^ears  afteiVards  it  was  drawn  from  its 
hiding-place  and  sold  to  some  connections  of  the  Crom- 
wells,  named  Russel,  in  Cambridgeshire.  It  then  got  into  the 
hands  of  one  Samuel  Russel,  who  publicly  exhibited  it.  By 
him  it  was  sold  in  April,  1787,  to  a  Mr.  Cox,  the  proprietor  of 
a  museum  in  Spring  Gardens.  On  the  dispersal  of  his  museum 
it  was  sold  for  £2-^3  to  three  joint  possessors,  who  made  a 
peep-show  of  it  in  Mead's  court.  Bond  street,  in  1799.  Finally 
it  became  the  property  of  the  daughter  of  one  of  these  persons. 
She  sold  it  to  Mr.  Wilkinson,  then  M.  P.  for  Lambeth,  and  by 
him  it  was  transmitted  to  his  son,  in  whose  possession  it  now  is. 

The  evidence  on  which  the  earlier  part  of  this  story  rests 
would  not,  we  fear,  bear  minute  investigation.  There  is,  in  the 
first  place,  no  authority  whatever,  except  mere  hearsay,  for 
the  story  of  the  sentinel.     If  the  government  issued  a  procla- 


3^6  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

mat  I  on  for  the  recovery  of  the  skuH,  some  record  of  that 
proclamation  would  undoubtedly  remain,  but  no  trace  of  that 
proclamation  has  been  discovered.  Between  the  abduction 
by  the  sentliK^l  and  the  transmission  to  the  Russels  its  history 
is  a  blank.  Another  skull  may,  with  a  view  to  a  negotiation 
with  the  Cromwell  family,  have  been  in  the  interval  easily 
substituted  in  place  of  that  originally  stolen.  It  would,  more- 
over, as  a  writer  in  "  Notes  and  Queries  "  well  observes,  be 
absurd  to  snppose  that  any  head  which  had  for  nearly  twenty 
years  been  exposed  to  such  an  atmosphere  as  ours,  could 
possibly  be  so  perfectly  preserved  as  the  head  in  Mr.  Wilkin- 
son's possession.  We  say  nothing  about  several  minor 
difhculties, — that,  for  example,  presented  by  the  existence  of 
the  other  skull  purporting  to  be  that  of  Cromwell  in  the 
Ashmolean  Museum  at  Oxford ;  and  the  discrepancy  presented 
by  the  fact  that,  according  to  one  version  of  the  legend,  the 
soldier  picked  up  the  head,  not  at  Westminster,  but  at  Temple 
Ban  The  strongest  evidence  in  favor  of  Mr.  Wilkinson  is  the 
evidence  of  Flaxman,  who  was  minutely  acquainted  with  all 
the  luemoriais  of  Cromwell's  features  which  art  has  left  us, 
and  who  was  therefore  eminently  qualified  to  give  an  opinion. 
But  in  these  cases  internal  evidence  is  of  comparatively  little 
value  unless  corroborated  by  evidence  from  without,  and  the 
testimony  of  facts  is  on  this  occasion  not  merely  deficient,  but 
contradictory.  At  every  step  in  this  strange  problem  we  are 
confronted  with  insuperable  difficulties.  There  is  no  proof 
that  Cromwell  was  ever  buried  in  the  Abbey  at  all.  If  the 
burial  be  assumed,  there  is  no  proof  that  the  body  exhumed  in 
1G60  was  his  body.  If  the  burial  and  the  exhumation  be 
assumed,  there  is  no  proof  that  the  corpse  left  the  Red  Lion 
:for  Tyburn.  Assuming  these  three  facts,  as  well  as  the  story 
of  the  sentinel,  there  is  no  proof  that  the  head  purloined  by 
him  was  identical  with  the  head  sold  to  the  Russels. 

We  are  glad  to  think  so.    We  should  be  sorry  to  imagine 
that  common  hands  could  maul  and  palter,  with  a  relic  so 


THE   UNITED  STATES.  32/ 

sacred — it  is  a  sacrilege  almost  too  horrible  to  realize.    Rather 
let  us  hope — and  there  are  good  reasons  for  hoping — that  as 
his  immortal  part  lives  forever  in  the  memory  of  a  grateful  peo- 
ple, so  his  mortal  part  has  long  since  mingled  with  the  mold. 
From  The  Gentleman's  Magazine. 


THE  UNITED  STATES 

AS   A   FIELD   FOR  AGRICULTURAL   SETTLERS.     * 

The  subject  of  this  paper  is  not  only  a  large,  one,  but  it  is 
one  on  which  much  has  been  said  and  written  already.  It  is 
also  true  that  a  most  able  and  exhaustive  report  on  the  agri- 
cultural capacity  of  America  has  been  recently  issued  by  the 
commission  which  was  appointed  by  the  late  Government  to 
inquire  into  the  causes  of  agricultural  distress  in  this  countiy. 
But  I  approach  the  subject  from  a  somewhat  different  point 
of  view.  The  purpose  for  which. the  assistant-commissioners 
were  sent  to  America  was  to  inquire  into  and  report  as  to  the 
probable  effect  of  American  competition  on  the  owners  and 
occupiers  of  land  in  this  country.  My  object  is  rather  to  in- 
quire what  are  the  prospects  of  those  who  contemplate  emi- 
grating to  America  with  a  view  to  bettering  their  condition, 
and  to  point  out  what  in  my  judgment  are  the  localities  best 
suited  for  intending  emigrants. 

I  shall  confine  myself,  as  the  title  of  this  paper  indicates,, 
to  the  United  States,  not  because  I  wish  to  ignore  or  dispar- 
age in  any  way  the  claims  of  Canada,  but  because  I  am  not  a 
competent  witness  with  respect  to  that  country.  When  I  was 
last  in  America*  I  was  not  on  Canadian  soil  at  all,  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  hours  which  I  passed  on  the  Canadian  side 
of  Niagara  Falls.  As  regards  the  great  and  fertile  district  of 
Manitoba  I  could  say  nothing  which  has  not  appeared  already 
in  books  or  newspapers.    And  even  in  respect  of  the  United 

*  A  few  months  ago. 


328  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

States  the  knowledge  which  I  have  acquired  from  personal 
Observation  is  limited  to  two  regions,  Western  Oregon  and 
Colorado,  though  I  have  endeavored  to  avail  myself  of  the 
best  sources  of  information  within  my  reach  as  to  other  parts 
of  the  country. 

Agricultural  emigrants  may  be  divided  into  two  classes : 
first,  those  who  intend  to  cultivate  their  farms  by  the  labor  of 
their  own  hands ;  second,  persons  possessed  of  more  or  less 
capital,  or  perhaps,  I  should  rather  say,  a  class  of  larger  capi- 
talists, for,  as  I  think  I  shall  show  presently  every  one  who 
goes  to  the  United  States  with  the  intention  of  owning  land, 
ought  to  be  possessed  of  a  certain  amount  of  capital. 

The  class  of  larger  capitalists  may  be  again  subdivided  into 
arable  and  pastoral  farmers.  In  the  more  newly  settled  West- 
ern States  this  line  is  much  more  sharply  drawn  than  it  is  in 
this  country.  In  Illinois  and  the  other  Middle  States  there 
are  many  persons  who  pursue  a  system  of  mixed  husbandry, 
who  raise  grain  crops  and  who  also  own  fine  herds  of  cattle. 
But  in  the  more  newly  settled  States  the  arable  farmers  for 
the  most  part  possess  very  little  live  stock  except  their  horses 
and  a  few  cows,  while  those  who  apply  themselves  to  rearing 
cattle  or  sheep  do  very  little  with  the  plow. 

^As  regards  the  agricultural  laborer  I  doubt  whether  a  man 
who  has  been  bred  to  agricultural  labor  only,  and  who  has 
not  the  command  of  some  little  capital,  is  likely  to  do  himself 
much  good  by  emigrating  to  the  United  States.  .Wages,  no 
doubt,  are  high,  while  there  is  work  to  be  done,  but  there  is 
not  so  much  constant  employment  as  in  this  country.  It  is 
very  much  the  practice  in  the -United  States  to  take  men  on 
by  the  job  and  to  discharge  them  after  the  work  has  been 
done.  And  as  there  is  very  little  gre^n  crop  grown  in  the 
United  States,  there  is  much  less  employment  there  for  women 
and  children  than  there  is  here. 

These  observations  are  borne  out  by  the  report  of  the  as- 
sistant commissioners  which  has  lately  been  issued.  They  say: 


THE  UNITED  STATES.  329 

* 

The  farm  laborer  can  hardly  be  said  to  exist  as  a  distinct  class  in  the  United  States, 
unief>s  it  be  among  the  colored  people  in  the  Middle  and  Southern  States.  In  the  large 
farms  of  the  West  the  bothy  system  is  carried  out,  and  buildings  are  put  up  in  which 
the  summer  men  mess  and  sleep.  In  winter' they  are  off  to  the  towns  and  cities,  and  it 
is  seldom  the  same  faces  are  seen  two  years  running  on  the  farm. 

It  should  be  remarked  though  wages  may  appear  high,  the  hours  of  labor  from 
spring  to  autumn  are  long,  and  winter  is  a  period  of  almost  complete  cessation  from 
work  for  man  and  beast  on  the  American  farm.  The  very  few  laborers  that  are  re- 
quired upon  a  wheat-growing  farm  in  America  during  the  dead  winter  months  is  sur- 
prising. In  one  instance  we- were  told  that  only  two  men  were  kept  upon  5,000  acres. 
When  the  longer  days  and  the  harder  work  of  the  American"  laborer,  together  with 
his  being  employed  only  when  he  is  wanted  are  taken  into  account,  the  annual  cost  of 
kboi^  per  acre  is  much  less  than  the  amount  paid  in  England. 

At  the  same  time  there  is  no  doubt  that  an  energetic  active 
man,  who  can  put  his  hand  to  anything,  who  can,  for  instance, 
take  a  spell  at  lumbering  or  at  carpenter  work  when  agricul- 
tural employment  is  scarce,  is  likely  to  do  exceedingly  well  in 
the  United  States. 

To  return  to  the  classes  who  are  possessed  of  some  capital. 
The  emigrant  who  wishes  to  cultivate  his  farm  with  his  own 
hands  may  either  enter  on  the  Government  land  which  is 
reserved  for  homesteads,  in  which  case  he  has  nothing  to  pay 
beyond  the  cost  of  the  survey,  amounting  only  to  a  few 
pounds,  or  he  may  purchase  land  and  pay  for  it  by  install- 
ments spread  over  a  term  of  .years.  In  the  case  of  the  Gov- 
ernment lands  he  cannot  homestead  more  than  160  acres,  but 
he  may  also  pre-empt,  as  it  is  called,  1 50  acres  more,  paying 
f<)r  it  at  the  rate  of  $1.25  an  acre,  if  more  than  twenty  miles 
from  a  railroad,  or  11^2.50,  or  a  little  more  than  los.  an  acre,  if 
within  twenty  miles.  He  has  to  pay  about  is.  an  acre  down, 
and  the  balance  at  the  end  of  five  years,  by  which  time  he 
must  have  executed  certain  improvements.  In  some  States 
he  may  pre-empt  640  acres  of  what  are  called  desert  lands, 
that  is  lands  which  will  not  grow  crops  without  irrigation. 
He  must  in  this  case  at  the  end  of  five  years  produce  a  certif- 
icate that  he  has  irrigated  the  land  so  as  to  make  it  grow 
crops. 

And  in  some  States  the  settlers  may  acquire  from  the  gov- 
ernment 160  acres  by  planting  ten  acres,  and  producing  a  cer- 


3 30  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA  GA  ZINE, 

tificate  at  the  end  of  eight  years  that  a  certain  number  of 
trees  are  in  a  healthy  growing  state. 

It  may  perhaps  be  asked  what  amount  of  money  a  settler 
ought  to  have  to  start  with.  To  begin  at  the  beginning,  the 
journey  out  from  Liverpool,  say  of  a  man  with  a  wife  and  two 
children,  to  the  place  where  they  intend  to  locate  themselves, 
will  cost  some  ;£45>  more  or  less.*  As  to  the  rest  I  will  take 
the  estimate  of  Mr.  Eaton,  a  successful  farmer  who  ow»s  a 
considerable  quantity  of  land  in  Colorado.  Mr.  Eaton's  letter, 
which  gives  the  amount  required  in  detail,  and  which,  besides 
contains  a  great  deal  of  valuable  information,  may  be  found 
in  a  pamphlet  entitled  "  Farm  Lands  in  Colorado,"  published 
by  the  Colorado  Company,  of  which  Mr.  Barclay,  M.P.  for 
Forfarshire,  is  chairman.  Mr.  Eaton  calculates  that  a  man 
with  a  wife  and  two  children  will  require  ;£326  to  support  himself 
and  family,  and  bring  a  farm  of  eighty  acres,  which  is  about  as 
much  as  a  man  with  a  pair  of  horses  can  till,  into  cultivation. 
If  we  add  £\^  for  the  cost  of  the  journey  out,  we  have  a  sum 
of  £yj\  as  the  amount  which  is  required  to  support  the  fam- 
ily, and  meet  the  necessary  outgoings  of  the  farm  until  the 
first  crop  has  been  reaped  and  marketed.  In  the  case  of  a 
man  who  enters  on  a  homestead  we  have  to  deduct  ;^43,  which 
Mr.  Eaton  puts  down  as  the  first  installment  of  the  purchase 
money,  because  the  homesteader  has  nothing  to  pay  for  the 
land,  and  we  thus  get  £y2.%  or  say,  including  the  cost  of  sur- 
vey, ;£335  as  the  amount  required.  The  man  who  enters  on  a 
homestead  with  this  sum  in  his  possession  ought,  if  this 
estimate  is  correct,  to  be  free  from  debt  and  able  to  invest  the 
proceeds  of  his  crop,  beyond  what  he  may  require  for  the  sup- 
port of  himself  and  family,  in  any  way  that  may  seem  best  to 
him.  But  there  are  some  drawbacks.  In  order  to  get  a 
homestead  a  man  must  now  go  very  far  west.  He  will  in  all 
probability  not  be  very  favorably  situated  as  regards  access  \.o 

*  The  above  is  about  the  cost  of  the  journey  to  Denver ;  to  Western  Minnesota  it^ 
will  be  somewhat  less. 


i 


THE  UmrED  STATES,  331 

markets,  and  consequently  the  prices  he  will  obtain  will  be  low. 
For  the  same  reason  he  may  probably  have  difficulty  in  pro- 
curing many  comforts  that  he  has  come  to  look  upon  almoS. 
as  necessaries  of  life,  and  he  may  have  to  pay  v^ry  high  prices 
for  them.  In  the  Northwestern  States  the  winters  are  very 
long,  the  cold  is  intense,  and  the  winds  are  piercing.  Lastly^ 
even  in  the  remote  Northwest,  great  part  of  the  best  lands 
has  been  taken  up  already.  When  I  was  returning  from  San 
Francisco  to  New  York,  I  met  a  man  who  told  me  that  he  had 
gone  into  the  territory  of  Dakotah  to  look  for  land,  and  that 
there  was  no  good  land  to  be  had,  except  by  purchase,  within 
five  hundred  miles  of  Bismarck,  which  is  the  furthest  point  to 
which  the  Northern  Pacific  railroad  has  yet  been  extended, 
and  which  is  some  f,2oo  miles  northwest  of  Chicago.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  emigrant  who  purchases  can  choose  his 
own  lo(?ation,  and  the  payment  is  generally  made  easy  to  him 
by  being  spread  over  a  term  of  years. 

Hitherto  I  have  been  referring  to  those  who  intend  to  till 
their  farms  themselves.  I  now  come  to  the  class  who  are 
possessed  of  more  capital,  and  who  would  desire  to  obtain 
land  in  larger  quantities.  If  the  settler's  capital  is  large 
enough,  I  think  it  is  better  to  buy  not  less  than  a  section, 
i.  e.  a  square  mile,  or  640  acres.  A  smaller  lot  costs  more  to 
fence  in  proportion  to  its  size.  Land  can  be  purchased  frona 
the  railway  companies  to  whom  the  government  has  made 
grants,  or  from  parties  who  have  acquired  land  froni  them. 
In  Western  Oregon  improved  farms,  that  is,  farms  with  a 
house  and  some  fences  on  them,  may  be  purchased  zft  from 
£S  to  £Z  an  acre  if  near  a  railroad.  Unimproved  and  uncleared 
lands  can  be  had  at  all  prices  down  to  $2.50  an  acre.  The 
land  in  the  yalley  is  open  prairie  ;  on  the  rolling  ground  at  the 
foot  of  the  hills  a  good  deal  of  it  is  covered  with  oak  scrub. 
The  cost  of  clearing  is  said  to  vary  from  $5  to  $15  per  acre. 
The  average  yield  is  reckoned  at  about  20  bushels  an  acre,  and 
it  is  said  the  crop  can  almost  a.lways  be  depended  upon.    The 


332  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MAGA2IN^, 

whole  of  Western  Oregon  is  within  comparatively  easy  reach 
of  Portland,  whence  the  grain  is  shipped'.  The  valley  is 
drained  by  the  Willamette  river,  which  is  navigable  for  a 
great  part  of  the  course;  there  are  also  two  railroads,  and 
another  in  course  of  being  constructed.  Land  at  some  little 
distance  from  the  existing  railroads  can  be  purchased,  I  be- 
lieve, for  about  £s  an  acre.  The  settler  in  Western  Oregon 
has  the  great  advantage  of  an  abundant  and  cheap  supply  of 
timber.  The  sides  of  the  mountains  and  the  edges  of  the 
streams  are  covered  with  splendid  firs,  some  of  them  200  feet 
high.  When  I  was  going  over  the  proposed  line  of  the 
Oregonian  railway,  I  came  across  a  splendid  fir  tree  which  was 
being  burned  down  by  means  of  a  live  coal  put  into  the  heart 
of  it.  I  asked  to  have  it  measured,  and  found  it  squared  seven 
and  one-half  feet.  They  told  me  that  there  was  not  enough 
timber  in  the  strip  where  this  tree  stood  to  make  4t  worth 
while  to  put  up  a  sawmill,  and  that  the  cheapest  mode  of  get- 
ting the  tree  out  of  the  way  was  to  burn  it.. 

In  Eastern  Oregon  land  may  be  bought  of  the  Northern 
Pacific  Railroad  Company  for  $2.60.  or  about  12^,  an  acre.  In 
some  seasons  this  land  is  said  to  be  very  productive,  yielding 
as  much  as  forty  bushels  of  wheat  per  acre,  but  the  country 
is.  sometimes  subject  to  droughts,  water  is  scarce  in  some 
places,  and  there  is  a  deficiency  of  timber.  The  rates  to  Port- 
land are  very  high,  but  this  will  probably  be  remedied  in  time 
by  theconstruction  of  anew  line  of  railroad,  and  I  think  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  those  who  purchase  land  at  present 
priceS'will  find  their  property  rise  considerably  in  value  mthc 
course  of  the  next  few  years. 

The  only  other  State  as  to  which  1  can  speak  from  personal 
knowledge  is  Colorado,  Good  land  can  be  bought  there  at 
present  for  about  $10,  or  a  little  over  £2  an  acre.  The  right 
to  take  water  for  irrigation  from  one  of  the  canals  costs  about 
£1  an  acre.  Land  in  Colorado,  from  the  extreme  dryness  of 
the  climate,  is  of  little  use  unless  it  is  either  irrigated  artifi- 


THE  UNITED  STATES,  333 

dally  or  flooded  \x\  winter  by  a  stream.  A  section  of  good  land 
with  the  necessary  water  rights  will  cost  about  ;^2,ooo.  'The 
price  may  be  spread  over  a  term  of  years,  but  the  rate  of  in- 
terest in  Colorado  is  high,  not  less  than  lo  per  cent  on  farm- 
ing lands,  so  that  those  who  possess  the  requisite  amount  of 
capital  will  probably  prefer  to  pay  the  money  down.  Mr. 
Barclay  puts  the  cost  of  bringing  the  land  into  cultivation, 
not  including  interest  on  the  purchase  money,  and  charging 
contmct  prices  for  the  ^jirork  done,  at  about  {p.  per  acre  for  the 
first  year,  so  that  the  whole  outlay  on  640  acres,  including  the 
purchase  money,  will  be  about  ;£3.30o.  To  this  estimate  of  Mr. 
Barclay's,  I  think,  some  other  items  should  be  added,  as,  for 
example,  from  ;£8o  to  £\qo  for  a  house  and  the  cost  of  fencing, 
which,  for  640  acres,  should  probably  be  about  ;^2oo.  But 
with  a  capital  of  something  less  than  ;£4.ooo  a  man  ought  to 
be  able  to  make  a  very  good  start  on  a  farm  of  640  acres.  As 
regards  the  question  whether  a  settler  had  better  locate  him- 
self in  Oregon  or  in  Colorado,  or  in  one  of  the  Northwestern 
States,  perhaps  I  shall  best  answer  it,  so  far  as  m,y  opinion  is 
worth  anything,  by  stating  what  I  have  done  myself.  After 
having  traversed  the  United  States  from  New  York  to  Puget 
Sound,  and  having  obtained  the  best  information  which  I  could 
procure,  I  have  purchased  land  in  Colorado  for  a  near  relation 
of  my  own,  who  intends  to  go  put  as  a  settler.  My  reasons 
are,  (i)  The  yield  on  irrigated  land  is  larger  than  either  in 
Western  Oregon  or  the  Northwestern  States,  (2)  Prices  of 
agricultural  produce  are  higher.  Mr.  Barclay  and  Mr.  Eaton 
both  concur  in  stating  that  after  the  first  year  twenty-five 
bushels  of  wheat  an  acre  may  fairly  be  looked  for  on  irrigated 
land  in  Colorado.  In  Western  Oregon  the  average  yield  is  put 
at  twenty  bushels  an  acre.  In  the  Northwestern  States  it  is  a 
good  deal-less.  Sixteen  bushels  an  acre  is  looked  upon  as  a  large 
crop  in  Minnesota,  one  of  the  large  wheat-growing  States.  In 
Iowa  it  is  less.  In  Dakotah  twenty-five  and  sometimes  even 
twenty-eight  bushels  are  raised,  but  these  cases  are  exceptipnal, 


334  •  THE  LIBRAR  V  MA GAZINE, 

and  are  found  on  the  monster  farms,  where  the  cultivation  of 
wheat  is  brought  to  a  great  perfection.  From  the  best  infor- 
mation I  can  obtain,  the  average  production  of  Dakotah  does 
not  much  exceed  fifteen  or  sixteen  bushels.  Then  as  to  prices. 
When  I  was  in  Portland,  wheat  was  selling  for  eighty-seven 
cents  a  bushel.  In  Denver  the  price  was  at  one  time  $1.20, 
and  it  has  not,  I  believe,  been  below  $1.10  this  year.  When 
we  look  at  the  prices  in  the  Northwestern  States,  the  dif- 
ference is  even  greater.  In  Western  Minnesota  and  Dakotah 
seventy-five  cents  a  bushel  is  considered  a  good  price  for 
wheat.  Without  going  into  the  elaborate  calculations,  I 
think  any  one  who  will  work  the  figures  out  for  himself  will 
see  that  it  will  pay  better  to  give  $15  an  acre  for  land  that  will 
grow  twenty-five  bushels,  which  will  fetch  $1.10  a  bushel, 
than  to  give  $5  an  acre  for  land  that  will  grow  sixteen  bushels, 
with  the  probability  that  the  price  may  fall  much  lower.  In 
each  case  the  price  of  the  land  will  be  paid  off  in  about  the 
same  time,  but  when  that  has  been  done,  the  owner  of  the 
higher  priced  and  more  fertile  land  will  be  in  possession  of  a 
much  more  remunerative  property.  But  are  the  high  prices 
of  agricultural  produce  in  Colorado  likely  to  continue  ?  I 
think  so.  Prices  there  do  not  depend  on  the  European 
markets.  There  is  a  large  local  demand  from  the  mining 
camps,  considerably  larger  than  the  State  itself  can  supply. 

Then  the  quantity  of  land  which  can  be  profitably  brought 
under  tillage  is  restricted  by  the  amount  of  water  which  can 
be  utilized  for  irrigation,  and  in  the  more  settled  parts  of  the 
State  there  will  soon  be  very  few  streams  remaining  which  are 
available  for  that  purpose.  As  regards  a  possible  fall  in  price 
in  consequence  of  importations  from  other  parts  of  the  United 
States,  the  Colorado  farmer  has  a  very  considerable  natural 
protection,  by  reason  of  the  great  distance  over  which  agri- 
cultural produce  has  to  be  carried.  Take  the  article  of  haj', 
for  instance,  which  is  in  great  demand.  Large  quantities  of 
hay  are  brought  into  Colorado  from  Kansas  City,  a  distance 


[ 


THE  UNITED   STATES.  '  335 

of  over  six  hundred  miles.  The  freight  from  Kansas  City  is 
$10  or  a  little  over  £2  a  ton,  which  of  itself  is  considered  a 
very  good  price  in  most  parts  of  the  United  States.  Great 
part  of  Western  Kansas  is  almost  a  desert  on  account  of  the 
want  of  rain  and  the  dearth  of  water.  And  though  in  time 
freights  from  Kansas  City  may  be  somewhat  reduced  by  the 
construction  of  competing  lines,  the  distance  can  never  be 
much  shortened,  inasmuch  as  the  Kansas  Pacific  runs  almost 
in  a  straight  line  from  Kansas  City  to  Denver, 

Other  articles  of  agricultural  produce  are  also  high  in  price. 
When  I  was  last  in  Denver  potatoes  were  selling  at  £^  a  ton, 
whereas  we  consider  £^  a  very  good  price  in  this  country. 
No  doubt  the  prices  both  of  hay  and  potatoes  were  somewhat 
exceptional  last  year,  as  the  season  had  been  dry  and  the  crop 
therefore  short.  Still  I  understand  that  these  articles  always 
fetch  a  high  price  as  compared  with  what  can  be  obtained  for 
them  in  most  other  parts  of  the  United  States.  There  are, 
too,  great  developments  projected  in  the  shape  of  railroads 
connecting  with  the  Colorado  lines,  and  passing  through 
Arizona  and  New  Mexico  to  ports  on  the  Pacific.  I  think 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  construction  of  these  lines  will 
tend  to  stimulate  the  growth  of  Denver  and  of  other  towns 
in  Colorado.  I  believe  that  any  one  who  purchases  land 
judiciously  in  Colorado  at  the  present  time  will  not  only 
receive  a  very  handsome  return  for  his  investment,  but  that 
the  capital  value  of  his  property  will  be  very  largely  enhanced 
in  the  course  of  the  next  few  years.  The  climate  of  Colorado 
is  dry  and  bracing,  owing  to  the  circumstance  that  even  the 
less  elevated  part  of  the  State  on  which  the  town  of  Denver 
stands  is  some  5,000  feet  above  the  sea.  It  is  never  oppres- 
sively hot.  In  winter  the  temperature  is  sometimes  very  low ; 
towards  the  end  of  last  November  the  thermometer  fell  to  20 
degrees  below  zero.  Bat  the  piercing  winds  which  in  winter 
sweep  over  the  prairies  of  Iowa  and  Minnesota  seldom  prevail 
in  Colorado.    Neither  is  the  settler  in  Colorado  liable  tb  Buf- 


33.6  '  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

fer  from  ague,  a  complaint  which  sometimes  attacks  the 
inhabitants  of  that  part  of  Western  Oregon  which  may  be 
described  as  the  valley  of  the  Willamette  river.  Indeed, 
invalids  from  many  parts  of  the  United  States  now  resort  to 
Colorado  in  search  of  purer  air  than  they  can  find  at  home. 
By  way  of  illustrating  the  extraordinary  clearness  of  the 
atmosphere  a  story  is  told  of  an  enthusiastic  tourist  who 
started  fcom  Denver,  hoping  to  reach  the  top  of  Pike's  Peak, 
the  higEest  mountain  in  sight,  and  return  next  day.  The 
base  of  the-  mountain  is  more  than  seventy-five  miles  from 
Denver,  and  the  summit  more  than  13,000  feet  above  the  sea, 
or  8,000  feet  above  the  level  of  the  town.  I  should  not  myself 
have  estimated  the  distance  to  Pike's  Peak  from  Denver  at 
much  more  than  twenty  miles. 

From  an  agricultural  point  of  view  Colorado  has  one  draw- 
back. Owing  to  the  absence  of  great  heat  in  summer  it  is  not 
possible  to  grow  large  crops  of  Indian  corn  as  is  done  in 
many  parts  of  the  United  States.  Corn  is  grown,  but  the 
yield  is  so  small  that  I  doubt  whether  it  is  a  profitable  crop. 
In  respect  of  other  hindrances  to  successful  farming,  the 
Colorado  beetle,  as  Mr.  Barclay  stated  in  an  article  which 
appeared  about  a  year  ago  in  the  Fortnightly  Review,  has 
never  been  seen  in  Colorado. 

Grasshoppers  did  a  good  deal  of  damage  at  one  time,  but  I 
understand  that  they  have  not  made  their  appearance  of  late 
years,  and  the  farmers  now  say  they  are  not  much  afraid  of 
them,  even  if  they  should  come,  both  because  the  area  under 
crop  being  considerably  larger  than  it  was  a  few  years  ago, 
the  damage  dome  would  be  spread  over  a  wider  surface  and 
therefore  less  felt,  and  also  because  they  think  they  Could 
find  means  of  destroying  them. 

To  any  one  who  is  fond  of  sport  Colorado  offers  great 
attractions.  The  mountain  lakes  are  full  of  trout*  and  the 
marshy  lands  swarm  with  ducks.  Deer  and  both  brown  and 
frizzly  bears  are  to  be  found  in  the  mountains. 


THE   UNITED  STATES.  337 

I  have  as  yet  referred  only  to  those  emigrants  who  desire 
to  settle  on  arable  lands.  But  it  is  well  known  that  the 
breeding  and  rearing  of  cattle  has  attained  large  proportions 
in  the  United  States.  The  profits  of  this  business  are  not 
what  they  were,  though  they  are  stiil  large.  I  have  been  told 
that  a  few  years  ago  it  was  not  uncommon  for  a  cattle  breeder 
to  clear  80  or  even  loo  per  cent  on  his  capital.  But  the  profit- 
able nature  of  the  trade  has  induced  large  numbers  of  persons 
to  engage  in  it  with  the  usual  and  indeed  inevitable  result, 
that  there  has  been  a  fall  in  profits.  Still,  I  believe  that  with 
good  management  from  25  to  30  par  cent  can  still  be  obtained 
on  the  money  invested.  The  business  of  cattle  breeding  in 
this  country  requires  considerably  more  capital  than  arable 
farming,  and  this  is  the  case  also  in  the  United  States.  I 
believe  the  smallest  number  with  which  it  is  worth  while  to 
start  is  about  1,000  head  of  cattlj^^fA  mixed  herd — ^that  is,  a 
herd  of  cows  and  calves,  yeat-MflgieviCMro-year-olds  and  three- 
year-olds  of  this  number — if  composed,  as  is  usually  the  case, 
partly  of  Texan  and  partly  of  what  are  called  graded  cattle — 
Texan  or  Colorados  crossed  with  shorthorns  or  Hereford  bulls 
—will  cost  about  ;£3.ooo.  It  takes  three  men  to  look  after 
1,000  cattle,  and  each  of  these  men  will  receive  about  £7^  a 
year  with  his  board.  Then  each  man  requires  several  horses 
or  ponies.  No  *  cowboy '  ever  thinks  of  walking  ;  if  he  were 
to  make  his  appearance  on  foot  among  the  cattle,  they  would 
either  cliarge  him  or  there  would  be  a  general  stampede.  I 
do  not  think  it  would  be  prudent  foi:  any  one  to  go  into  the 
cattle  business  without  a  capital  of  some  £^.000.  And  the 
larger  capitalists  have  a  considerable  advantage,  because  a 
large  herd  can  be  much  more  economically  worked  than  a 
small  one.  The  reason  is  that  the  number  of  men  who  have 
to  be  employed  in  looking  after  the  cattle  does  not  require  to 
be  increased  in  the  same  ratio  as  the  herd.  It  takes  three 
men  to  look  after  1,000  cattle,  but  five  men  can  look  after  2,000, 
and  a  herd  of  20,000  cattle  can  be  worked  much  more  econom- 


338  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ically  than  one  of  2,000.  I  do  not  think  that  Colorado  is  a 
good  place  for  the  small  capitalist,  the  man  with  £j^,ooo  or 
;£5.ooo,  to  enter  upon  the  cattle  business.  I  was  told  that 
what  was  called  the  free  ranches,  the  lands,  that  is,  on  which 
any  one  may  turn  out  his  cattle,  were  all  overstocked ;  and 
that  in  consequence  the  cattle  on  them  did  not  thrive  or  fatten 
as  they  used  to  do. 

The  really  good  ranches  are  virtually  in  the  hands  of  a  few 
owners.  In  theory  it  is  open  to  any  one  to  turn  out  his  cattle 
on  the  plains,  but  the  water  frontages  have  been  bought  up 
and  fenced  off,  and  as  the  land  is  of  no  use  without  water  for 
the  cattle  to  drink,  the  man  who  owns  the  water  frontage  also 
practically  owns  the  pasturage  adjoining  it ;  so  that  if  any  one 
now  wishes  to  go  in  for  cattle  in  Colorado,  he  must  begin  by 
buying  out  some  one  who  owns  a  water  frontage. 

But  there  is  still  abiijo^ljuijce  of  land  in  the  United  States 
over  which  a  man  mayi^tia^^  cattle  free  of  charge.  In  Texas 
there  are  immense  masses  of  fine  pasture  land  as  yet  unoccu- 
pied. I  should  not,  however,  from  what  I  have  heard  of  the 
country,  advise  any  one  to  go  to  Texas.  The  people  in  many 
parts  of  the  State  are  very  wild  and  lawless,  and  settlers  in 
the  southern  part,  near  the  Rio  Grande,  are  exposed  to  the 
depredations  of  the  Mexicans  who  come  across  the  frontier 
and  carry  off  cattle.  Then  Texas  is  very  unhealthy  for  the 
better  class  of  cattle.  Cattle  of  improved  breeds,  if  brought 
into  Texas  after  they  are  twelve  months  old,  succumb  to  the 
climate,  and  it  is  only  by  bringing  them  in  very  young  that  it 
is  possible  to  acclimatize  them.  As  for  the  native  Texan 
cattle,  they  are  the  type  of  all  that  a  beef-producing  animal 
should  not  be,  they  have  narrow  chests,  long  legs,  and  backs 
like  razors.  I  never  handled  one,  but  they  look  as  if  they 
had  very  hard  hair  and  skins.  Their  beef  is  hard  and  stringy, 
and  fetches  the  lowest  price  in  the  American  market. 

In  the  Territory  of  Wyoming  there  is  still  grazing  land  to 
be  had  free,  and  in  Dakotah'and  Montana  there  are  large  tracts 


THE  UNITED  STATES.  339 

still  open.  The  ranchman  has  many  hardships  to  bear.  In 
summer  he  has  to  follow  his  cattle  undfer  a  burning  sun.  In 
winter  he  has  often  to  camp  out  in  the  snow.  He  has  to  be 
absent  for  long  periods  of  time  from  civilized  society,  he  has 
to  live  on  hard  fare,  and  often  to  dispense  with  many  comforts 
which  we  have  come  to  look  on  as  necessaries  of  life.  He 
sometimes  suffers  heavy  losses  from  dry  summers  and  severe 
winters.  Still,  to  many  men,  the  free  life  in  the  open  air  has 
a  quiet  charm.  I  hardly  think,  however,  that  a  settler,  going 
out  from  this  country,  would  act  wisely  in  at  once  entering  on 
the  cattle  business.  It  is  a  business  which  has  to  be  learned 
like  any  other,  and  I  think  a  young  man  going  to  the  United 
States  would  do  well  to  wait  a  year  or  two  before  he  starts  a 
herd  of  his  own.  This  business  is  not  like  that  of  arable  farm- 
ing. Many  men  go  out  from  this  country  to  the  United  States 
who  know  very  little  of  farming,  and  who  after  a  time  get  on 
very  well.  They  may  make  mistakes  at  first,  but  they  come 
right  at  last.  But  then  the  land  is  always  there  to  fall  back 
on.  But  if  a  man  invests  his  money  in  a  herd  of  cattle,  and 
mismanages  them,  he  may  lose  not  his  income  only,  but  his 
capital,  or  a  great  part  of  it.  Sheep-breeding  is  practiced  on  a 
larger  scale  in  Eastern  Oregon  and  California,  and  in  Montana, 
New  Mexico,  and  Texas.  The  profits  are  large^  but  the  risks 
are  considered  to  be  greater  than  in  the  case  of  cattle.  Sheep 
require  more  attention  than  cattle.  They  are  subject  to  scab 
and  other  infectious  diseases  to  which  cattle  are  not  liable  ; 
and  it  is  more  difficult  to  bring  them  through  a  severe  winter. 
In  some  of  the  ranges  of  Colorado  there  is  a  poisonous  grass 
which  kills  sheep.  Cattle  either  do  not  eat  it  or  do  not  suffer 
from  it.  A  considerable  number  of  lambs  are  destroyed  every 
year  by  the  prairie  wolves.  As  in  this  country,  cattle  and 
sheep  do  not  thrive  on  the  same  pastures.  The  sheep  eat  out 
the  best  grasses,  and  leave  nothing  for  the  cattle  but  the 
coarser  herbage.  As  a  natural  consequence,  the  men  who 
turn  out  sheep  on  the  free  ranges  are  very  unpopular  with  the 


340  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GA  ZINE. 

breeders  of  cattle.  It  does  not  appear  that  much  attention 
has  as  yet  been  paid  in  the  United  States  to  the  improvement 
of  the  breed  of  sheep.  At  the  great  cattle  show  held  at  Chi- 
cago in  November  last,  the  sheep  from  Canada,  both  Merinos 
and  Cotswolds,  were  very  superior  to  any  that  were  exhibited 
by  the  flockmasters  of  the  United  States. 

And  now  let  me  express  a  hope  that  none  of  those  who 
may  read  this  paper  will  be  tempted  to  invest  their  means  in* 
this  or  that  State,  on  the  strength  of  what  they  may  have 
read,  without  first  making  full  inquiry  for  themselves.  I 
should  be  sorry  to  have  such  a  responsibility  put  upon  me. 
And  let  me  put  in  a  word  by  way  of  caution  to  those  who  may 
be  tempted  by  the  offers  of  land  in  America  on  the  part  of 
the  various  companies  which  sometimes  appear  in  the  news- 
papers here.  We  may  depend  upon  it  these  offers  are  not 
made  out  of  pure  benevolence,  and  that  the  vendor  does  not 
fail  to  put  a  very  handsome  bonus  in  his  pocket.  I  will  give 
an  instance  of  the  large  profits  which  these  middlemen  some- 
times expect.  Some  time  since  a  company,  with  which  I  am 
connected,  was  offered  a  tract  of  land  in  Texas  for  60  cents, 
or  about  half  a  crown  an  acre,  by  an  American.  We  had  sent 
out  to  the  United  States  a  gentleman  from  this  country  in 
whom  we  had  confidence,  with  instructions  to  examine  the 
lands  which  were  offered  for  sale  and  to  report  on  them.  He 
informed  us  that  the  parties  who  were  in  possession  of  the 
Texas  land  grant  offered  the  land  at  40  cents,  so  that  if  we  had 
closed  with  the  offer  of  the  American  land  speculator,  he 
would  have  pocketed  a  commission  of  50  percent.  As  it  hap- 
pened, we  did  not  purchase  the  land,  but  if  we  had  bought  it 
direct  from  the  owners,  the  difference  between  the  price  which 
we  should  have  given  them  and  that  which  would  have  been 
received  by  the  land  speculator,  would  have  more  than 
covered  the  remuneration  and  expenses  of  the  gentleman 
whom  we  sent  out  to  report,  though  he  was  several  months  in 
America,  and  traveled  many  thousand  miles.    If  any  consid- 


THE  UNITED  STATES.  341 

erable  number  of  persons  should  think  of  trying  their  fortunes 
in  the  United  States  I  think  they  could  not  do  better  than 
follow  the  example  of  the  farmers  in  the  south  of  Scotland. 
Some  two  years  ago  they  clubbed  together  and  sent  out  some 
of  their  number  to  examine  the  country  arid  report  upon  it. 
Any  one  who  may  go  out  with  the  view  of  obtaining  informa- 
tion, either  for  himself  or  his  friends,  will  find"  many  of  his 
countrymen  either  settled  in  the  States  and  in  Canada,  or 
residing  there  temporarily,  who  will  be  ready  to  give  him  all 
the  assistance  in  their  power.  And  in  every  part  of  North 
America  I  believe  that  English  and  Scotch  settlers  are  very 
popular ;  there  is  no  jealousy  of  them,  but  they  are  welcomed 
as  men  who  are  likely  to  make  good  citizens,  and  to  develop 
the  resources  of  the  country.  AlRLlE. 

Postscript. 
Since  the  above  paper  was  written,  the  contract  between  the  Canadian  gov- 
ernment and  the  syndicate  which  has  been  formed  for  constructing  the  Can- 
adian Pacific  Railway  has  been  laid  before  the  Dominion  parliament.  If  I  am 
rightly  informed  as  to  the  terms  of  that  contract,  no  maximum  rates  for  freight 
are  to  be  imposed  on  the  railway  company,  but  they  are  to  be  allowed  to  charge 
as  much  as  they  can  get ;  and,  further,  the  construction  of  any  line  that  might 
compete  with  the  Canadian  Pacific  is  to  be  prohibited  for  a  period  of  twenty  years. 
It  may  be  that  the  political  necessity  for  constructing  the  Canadian  Pacific 
railroad  is  so  great  that  the  Canadian  government  has  had  no  choice  but  to  ac- 
cept these  onerous  terms.  But  I  am  afraid  that  they  will  militate  very  much 
against  the  rapid  settlement  of  the  country.  It  is  clear  that  settlers  in  North- 
western Canada,  who  are  dependent  on  a  railroad  which  has  such  an  unquali- 
fied monopoly  conferred  on  it,  will  be  placed  at  a  great  disadvantage  as  com- 
pared with  their  neighbors  in  the  United  States,  where  any  one  can  obtain  a 
charter  for  a  railroad  if  he  can  find  the  capital  required  to  build  it. 

The  Earl  of  Airlie,  in  The  Nineteenth  Century. 


342  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 


ON  NOVELS  AND  NOVEL-MAKERS. 

fiY  AN   OLD  NOVELIST. 

*'  Set  a  thief  to  catch  a  thief."  Well — even  so !  And  "  Honor 
among  thieves" — you  may  always  find  the  proverb  and 
counter-proverb — is  an  equally  noble  sentiment.  I  am  not 
going  to  lay  bare  the  secrets  of  the  prison-house. 

Still,  may  not  the  ancient  gladiator  be  allowed  to  haunt  his 
former  arena,  to  examine  and  criticise  the  combatants,  to 
watch  with  interest  the  various  "throws"?  And  the  old 
vocalist,  who  has  quietly  dropped,  let  us  hope  in  good  time, 
into  the  teacher  of  singing— is  it  unnatural  that  he  should 
sometimes  like  to  frequent  the  stalls,  and  make  his  own  com- 
ments on  his  brethren  still  before  the  foot-lights  ?  For  he 
loves  his  art  as  much  as  ever;   he  understands  its  secrets 

perhaps  better  than  ever — only But  peace !    Is  he  not 

an  aged  gladiator — a  tired  singer?  Happy  for  him  if  he  is 
wise  enough  to  recognize  this  fact  and  act  upon  it. 

Yes — there  comes  a  time  when  we  authors  must  accept  the 
truth,  that  it  is  better  for  us,  as  welf  as  our  books,  to  be 
"  shelved."  We  ought  never  to  write  at  all  unless  we  have 
something  to  say,  and  there  are  few  things  sadder  than  to  see 
a  writer,  to  whom  the  world  has  listened,  and  listened  with 
pleasure, go  on  feebly  repeating  himself,  sinking  from  origin- 
ality into  mediocrity,  and  then  into  the  merest  commonplace. 
"  Stop  in  time,"  is  the  wisest  advice  that  can  be  given  to  all 
who  live  by  their  brains.  These  brains — even  if  the  strongest 
— will  only  last  a  certain  time,  and  do  a  certain  quantity  of 
work — really  good  work.  Alas !  for  those  authors  who  have 
to  live  upon  their  reputation  after  their  powers  are  gone. 

Biit  though  the  impulse  of  genius  melts  away,  and  even 
talent  ca«  be  worn  out  in  time,  there  is  one  thing  which, 
among  much  lost,  is  assuredly  gained,  and  that  is  experience. 
The  quickness  to  detect  faults  won  through  fighting  with  our 


^ 


ON  NO  VEL  S  A  XD  NO  I  ^EL-MAKERS,  343 

own,  and  the  knowledge  how  to  rectify  these  errors  when 
found,  are  advantages  we  possess  still,  and  should  not  lightly 
underrate.  Therefore,  if  after  having  written  novels  for  more 
than  a  quarter  of  a  century,  I  have  lately  tried  reading  them, 
I  may  be  ■  allowed  a  few  words  I  trust  none  which  of  my 
co-mates  will  misconstrue,  nor  their  readers,  and  mine,  misap- 
prehend ? 

Novel-making — I  use  the  word  designedly,  for  it  is  a  mistake 
to  suppose  that  a  novel  makes  itself — is  not  an  impulse,  but 
an  art.  The  poet  may  be  "  born,  not  made  ;"  but  the  novelist 
must  make  himself  one,  just  as  much  as  any  carpenter  or 
bricklayer.  You  cannot  build  a  house  at  random  or  without 
having  learned  the  bricklayer's  trade,  and  by  no  possibility 
can  you  construct  a  three-volume  story,  which  shall  be  a  real, 
enduring  work  of  art,  without  having  attained  that  mechan- 
ical skill  which  is  as  necessary  to  genius  as  the  furnace  to  the 
ore  and  the  lapidary's  tool  to  the  diamond.  And  since  most 
long-experienced  workmen  are  supposed  to  know  something 
of  their  tools,  and  the  way  to  use  them,  as  well  as  to  be  toler- 
able judges  of  the  raw  material  in  which  they  have  worked 
all  their  days,  I  do  not  apologize  for  writing  this  paper.  It 
may  be  useful  to  some  of  those  enthusiastic  young  people 
who  think — as  a  fashionable  lady  once  said  to  me — **  Oh,  how 
charming  it  must  be  to  write  a  novel !  Couldn't  you  teach 
me  }  "  No ;  I  was  afraid  not.  And  though  work  is  genius — 
as  some  one  has  said,  and  not  quite  without  truth — I  could 
not  advise  my  )'X)ung  friend  to  try. 

Novel — the  word,  coming  from  the  Italian  novella,  implies 
something  new :  a  rifacciomento,  or  re-making,  in  an  imagina- 
tive shape,  of  the  eternally  old  elements  of  moral  life,  joy  and 
sorrow,  fortune  and  misfortune,  love  and  death.  Also,  virtue 
and  vice;  though  whether  the  novel  should  illustrate  any 
special  moral,  is  a  much-debated  question. 

Apparently,  beyond  some  vague  notions  of  virtue  rewarded 
and  vice  punished,  the  old   romancists  did  not  consider  r 


344  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

"  moral "  necessary.  There  is  certainly  no  "  purpose  "  in  the 
Arabian  Night's  Entertainments,  or  the  Decameron  of  Bocca- 
cio ;  nor  very  much  in  Sir  Charles  Grandison.  Probably  less 
than  none  in  Tom  Jones,  and  others  of  the  same  age  and  class. 
Even  the  author  of  Waverley,  the  Shakespeare^of  novelists, 
only  teaches  us,  as  Shakespeare  does,  by  implication.  It  has 
been  left  ta  tuodern  writers  to  convert  the  nov^el  into  a  sort  of 
working  isLeam-engine,  usable  for  all  purposes;  to  express 
tlnough  Lheir  pet  theories  of  religion  or  morality,  their  opinions 
on  socud  wrongs  and  remedies,  and  their  views  on  aesthetic 
and  philosophical  subjects.  From  the  art  of  cookery  up — or 
down^to  the  law  of  divorce,  anybody  who  thinks  he  has 
anything  ic>  say,  says  it  in  three  volumes,  mashed  up,  like  hard 
potcitoes,  in  the  milk  and  butter  of  fiction. 

A  portion,  however,  of  our  modern  novel-writers  repudiate 
the  idea  of  having  any  moral  purpose  whatever;  and,  truly, 
lew  of  their  readers  can  accuse  them  of  it.  ^Amusement  pure 
and  simple — not  always  either  simple  or  pure,  but  always 
amusement — is  their  sole  aim.  They — that  is  the  cleverest  of 
them — are  satisfied  to  cut  a  bit  at  random  out  of  the  wonder- 
ful web  of  lifc^  and  present  it  to  you  just  as  it  is,  wishing  you 
to  accept  it  as  such,  without  investigating  it  too  closely,  or 
pausing  to  consider  whether  the  pattern  is  complete,  what 
the  mode  and  reason  of  the  wearing,  and  whether  you  only 
see  a  part  or  the  whole.  That  there  is  a  whole — that  life  is 
not  chance-work,  but  a  great  design,  with  the  hands  of  the 
Divine  Artificer  working  behind  it  all — so  seldom  comes  into 
their  calculations  that  they  do  not  expect  it  to  come  into 
yours.  Therefore,  with  a  daring  and  sometimes  almost  blas- 
wphemous  inc^enuity,.  they  put  themselves  to  play  Providence, 
to  set  up  tlieir  puppets  and  knock  them  down,  and  make 
them  between  whiles  "play  such  fantastic  tricks  before  hig^ 
heaven,"  that  one  feels  heaven's  commonest  law  of  right  anc^  f 
wrong  would  lo  them  be,  to  say  the  least,  extremely  incon-^^ 
venient. 


4 


ON  NOVELS  AND  NOVEL-MAKERS.  345 

'  But  to  return.  Certainly — whatever  my  fashionable  young 
friend  might  think — no  one  can  be  taught  to  write  novels. 
But  to  suppose  that  novel-writing  comes  by  accident  or  im- 
pulse— that  the  author  has  only  to  sit  with  his  pen  in  his 
hand  and  his  eyes  on  the  ceiling,  waiting  for  the  happy  mo- 
ment of  inspiration,  is  an  equal  mistake. 

To  make  a  novel — ^that  is,  to  construct  out  of  the  ever- 
changing  kaleidoscope  of  human  fate  a  picture  of  life  which 
shall  impress  people  as  being  life-like,  and  stand  out  to  its 
own  and  possibly  an  after  geiTerrtion,  as  such — this  is  a  task 
that  cannot  be  accomplished  without  genius,  but  which  gen- 
ius, unaided  by  mechanical  skill,  generally  fails  to  accomplish 
thoroughly.  Much  of  what  is  required  comes  not  by  intui- 
tion but  experience.  "  How  do  j^ou  write  a  novel  ?  "  has  been 
asked  me  hundreds  of  times  ;  and  as  half  the  world  now  writes 
novels,  expecting  the  other  half  to  read  them,  my  answer 
given  in  plain  print,  may  not  be  quite  useless.  The  shoe- 
maker, who  in  his  time  has  fitted  a  good  many  feet,  need  not 
hesitate  to  explain  his  mode  of  measuring,  how  he  cuts  and 
sews  his  leather,  and  so  on.  He  can  give  a  hint  or  two  on 
the  workmanship ;  the  materials  are  beyond  his  power. 

What  other  novelists  do  I  know  not,  but  this  has  been  my 
own  way — ab  ovo.  For,  I  contend,  all  stories  that  are  meant 
to  live  must  contain  the  germ  of  life,  the  ^g^,  the  vital  prin- 
ciple. A  novel,  *'with  a  purpose"  may  be  intolerable,  but  a 
novel  without  a  purpose  is  more  intolerable  still — as  feeble 
and  flaccid  as  a  man  without  a  back  bone.  Therefore  the 
first  thing  is  to  fix  on  a  central  idea,  like  the  spine  of  a  human 
being  or  the  trunk  of  a  tree.  Yet  as  nature  never  leaves 
either  bare,  but  clothes  them  with  muscle  and  flesh,  branches 
and  foliage,  so  this  leading  idea  of  his  book  will  be  by  the 
true  author  so  successfully  disguised  or  covered  as  not  to 
^btrude  itself  objectionably;  indeed,  the  ordinary  reader 
\ight  not  even  to  suspect  its  existence.  Yet  from  it,  this 
W  principal  idea,  proceed  all  after-growths  :  the  kind  of  plo' 


^  346  THE  UBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

which  shall  best  develop  it.  the  characters  which  must  act  it 
out,  the  incidents  which  will  express  these  characters,  even  to 
the  conversations  which  evolve  and  describe  these  incidents, 
all  are  sequences,  following  one  another  in  natural  order, 
even  as  from  the  seed-germ  result  successively  the  trunk, 
limbs,  branches,  twigs,  and  leafage  of  a  tree.  ^ 

This,  if  I  have  put  my  meaning  clearly,  shows  that  a  con- 
scientiously written  novel  is  by  no  means  a  piece  of  impulsive, 
accidental  scribbling,  but  a  deliberate  work  of  art :  that  though 
in  one  sense  it  is.  alsa  a  woe k  of  nature,  since  every  part 
ought  to  result  from  and  be  kept  subservient  to  the  whole, 
still,  in  another,  the  novel  is  the  last  thing  that  ought  to  be 
allowed  to  say  of  itself,  like  Topsy,  "  Spects  I  growed." 

Not  even  as  to  the  mere  writing  of  it.  Style  or  composi- 
tion, though  to  some  it  comes  naturally,  does  not  come  to  all. 
When  I  was  young  an  older  and  more  experienced  writer 
once  said  to  me,  "  Never  use  two  adjectives  where  one  will 
do  >  never  use  an  adjective  at  all  where  a  noun  will  do.  Avoid 
italics,  notes  of  exclamation,  foreign  words  and  quotations. 
Put  full  stops  insteads  of  colons ;  make  your  sentences  as 
short  and  clear  as  you  possibly  can,  and  whenever  you  think 
you  have  written  a  particularly  fine  sentence,  cut  it  out." 

More  valuable  advice  could  not  be  given  to  any  young 
author.  It  strikes  at  the  root  of  that  slip-shod  literature  of 
which  we  find  so  much  nowadays,  even  in  writers  of  genius. 
To  these  latter  indeed  it  is  a  greater  temptation ;  their  rapid, 
easy  pen  runs  on  as  the  fancy  strikes,  and  they  do  not  pause 
to  consider  that  in  a  novel,  as  in  a  picture,  breadth  is  indis- 
pensable. Every  part  should  be  made  subservient  to  the 
whole.  You  must  have  a  foreground  and  background  and  a 
middle  distance.  If  you  persist  in  working  up  one  character, 
or  finishing  up  minutely  one  incident,  your  perspective  will 
be  destroyed,  and  your  book  become  a  mere  collection  of 
fragments,  not  a  work  of  art  at  all.  The  true  artist  will  always 
be  ready  to  sacrifice  any  pet  detail  to  the  perfection  of  the 
whole. 


ON  NO  VELS  AND  NO  VEL-MAKERS.  347 

Sometimes,  I  allow,  this  is  hard.  One  gets  interested- 
novel-writers  only  know  how  interested ! — in  some  particular 
character  or  portion  of  the  plot,  and  is  tempted  to  work  out 
these  to  the  injury  of  the  rest.  Then  there  usually  comes  a 
flat  time,  say  about  the  second  volume,  when  the  first  impe- 
tus has  subsided,  and  the  excitement  of  the  denouement  has 
not  yet  com«,  yet  the  storj'^  must  be  spun  on  somehow,  if  only 
to  get  to  something  more  eiciting.  This  may  account  for  the 
fact  that  so  many  second  volumes  are  rather  dull.  But  a 
worse  failure  is  when  vol.  iii.  dwindles  down,  the  interest 
slowly  diminishing,  to  nothing.  Or  else  the  story  is  all  hud- 
dled up,  everybody  marriefl  or  killed  somehow — not  as  we 
novelists  try  to  do  it,  "  comfortably  " — but  in  a  hasty,  unsat- 
isfactory manner,  which  makes  readers  wonder  why  the  end 
is  so  unworthy  of  the  beginning. 

Either  mistake  is  fatal,  and  both  commonly  proceed  from 
carelessness,  or  from  the  lack  of  that  quality,  without  which 
no  good  work  is  possible,  the  infinite  capacity  of  taking  trou- 
ble. "Look  at  my  MS.,"  said  a  voluminous  writer  once  to 
me ;  "  there  is  hardly  a  single  correction  in  it,  and  this  is  my 
first  draft.  I  never  copy  and  I  rarely  alter  a  line."  It  would 
have  been  uncivil  to  say  so,  but  I  could  not  help  thinking 
that  both  author  and  public  would  have  been  none  the  worse 
if  my  friend  had  altered  a  good  many  lines,  and  re-copied  not 
a  few  pages ! 

While  on  the  question  of  MSS.,  let  me  say  one  practical 
word.  Authors  are  apt  to  think  that  any  sort  of  "  copy  "  is 
good  enough  for  the  press.  Quite  the  contrary.  An  untid)'-, 
useless,  illegible  MS.  is  an  offense  to  the  publisher,  dangerous 
irritation  to  his  "  reader,"  and  to  the  printer  an  absolute  cru- 
elty. Also,  many  proof  corrections  often  made  so  wantonly, 
and  costing  so  much  trouble  and  money,  are  severely  to  be 
condemned.  Doubtless  the  genus  irritabile  has  its  wrongs, 
from  hard-headed  and  often  hard-hearted  men  of  business, 
but  volumes  might  be  written  about  the  worry,  the  loss,  the 


348  THE  LIBI(aRY  MAGAZINE, 

actual  torment  that  inaccurate,  irregular,  impecfinious  and 
extravagant  authors  are  to  that  much-enduring  and  necessa- 
rily silent  class — their  publishers. 

An  accusation  is  often  mad5  against  us  novelists,  that  we 
paint  our  characters,  especially  our  ridiculous  or  unpleasant 
characters,  from  life.  Doubtless  many  second-rate  writers  do 
this — thereby  catching  the  ill-natured  class  of  readers,  which 
always  enjoys  seeing  its  neighbor  "  shown  up."  But  a  really 
good  novelist  would  scorn  to  attain  popularity  by  such  mean 
devices.  Besides,  any  artist  knows  that  to  paint  exactly  from 
life  is  so  difficult  as  to  be  almost  impossible.  -Study  from  life 
he  must — copying  suitable  heads,  arms,  or  legs,  and  appro- 
priating bits  of  character,  personal  or  mental  idiosyncrasies, 
making  use  of  the  real  to  perfect  the  ideal.  But  the  ideal, 
his  own,  should  be  behind  and  beyond  it  all.  The  nature  to 
which  he  holds  up  the  mirror  should  be  abstract,  not  individ- 
ual ;  and  he  must  be  a  poor  creator  who  Can  only  make  his 
book  by  gibbeting  therein  real  people,  like  kite^  and  owls  on 
a  barn-door,  for  the  amusement  and  warning  of  society. 

We  authors  cannot  but  smile  when  asked  if  such-and-such 
a  character  is  "  drawn  from  life,"  and  especially  when  ingen- 
ious critics  fancy  they  have  identified  certain  persons,  places, 
or  incidents — almost  always  falsely.  Of  course,  we  go  about 
the  world  with  our  eyes  open — but  what  we  see  and  how  we 
use  it,  is  known  only  to  ourselves.  Our  sitters  are  never 
aware  they  are  being  painted,  and  rarely,  if  ever,  recognize 
their  own  likenesses.  Whether  or  not  it  may  be  allowable  to 
hold  up  to  public  obloquy  a  bad  or  contemptible  character,  I 
suppose  it  would  be  fair  to  describe  a  perfect  character — if  we 
could  find  it !  which  is  not  too  probable.  For  me  I  can  only 
say  that  during  all  the  years  I  have  studied  humanity,  I  never 
met  one  human  being  who  could  have  been  "  put  in  a  book,"  as 
a  whole,  without  injuring  it.  The  only  time  I  ever  attefi^pted 
(by  request)  to  make  a  study  from  nature — absolutely  liW^ 
—all  the  reviewers  cried  out,  to  my  extreme  amuseme 
'*  This  character  i^  altogether  unnatural." 


u 


ON  NO  VELS  AND  NO  VEL-MAKERS.  349 

Hitherto  I  have  considered  the  novel  simply  as  a  literary 
achievement— a  book  "clever,"  " interesting,"^-above  all,  a 
book  "  that  will  sell."  But  there  is  a  higher  and  deeper  view 
of  it,  which  no  writer  can  escape,  and  no  conscientious  writer 
would  ever  wish  to  escape.  If  we,  poor  finite  mortals,  begin 
telling  stories,  we  take  into  our  feeble  hands  the  complicated 
machinery  of  life,  of  which  none  can  understand  the  whole, 
and  very  few  even  the  smallest  bit ;  we  work  it  out  after  our 
own  fancy,  moral  or  no  moral ;  we  invent  our  own  puppets 
and  put  them  through  their  marionnette-like  antics,  in  imita- 
tion of  the  great  drama  which  a  mysterious  Hand  is  for  ever 
playing  with  us  human  beings — and  sometimes  we  think  we 
can  do  it  quite  as  well,  if  we  had  the  chance  !  But  do  we  ever 
consider  that  in  making  up  from  imagination  a  picture  of 
reality,  we  are,  in  rather  a  dangerous  way,  mimicking  Provi- 
dence }  much  as  children  do  with  their  dolls  when  they  make 
them  go  to  school,  or  be  put  to  bed,  or  have  the  measles  :  im- 
itating ordinary  child-life,  so  far  as  they  understand  it,  in  their 
innocent  way.  But  our  ways  are  not  always  innocent,  and 
our  wisdom  is  sometimes  less  than  a  child's.  A  bad  novel, 
which  does  not  "  justify  the  ways  of  God  to  men  " — as  Milton 
vainly  tried  to  do  in  Paradise  Lost — but  leaves  behind  it  the 
impression  that  the  world  is  all  out  of  joint,  that  there  is  no 
difference  between  right  and  wrong,  and  nothing  in  life  worth 
living  for — such  a  novel  does  more  harm  than  a  dozen  atheisti- 
cal books,  or  a  hundred  dull,  narrow-minded  sermons.  Pois- 
on, taken  as  such,  may  find  an  antidote ;  there  is  no  defense 
against  it  when  administered  in  the  form  of  food. 

That  the  novel,  not  only  in  its  literary  but  moral  form,  is  an 
engine  of  enormous  power,  no  one  could  doubt  who  had  the 
reading  of  the  letters  received,  say  in  a  single  year,  or  even  a 
single  month,  by  any  tolerably  well-known  author,  from  all 
parts  of  the  world,  and  from  total  strangers  of  every  age, 
class,  and  degree.  Not  merely  the  everlasting  autograph  beg- 
gars, or  the  eulogists,  generally  conceited  egotists,  who  enjoy 


3 so  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

the  vanity  of  corresponding  with  celebrated  folk,  but  the 
honest,  well-meanjng,  and  often  most  touching  letter-writers, 
•  who  pour  out  their  simple  hearts  to  the  unknown  friend  who 
has  exercised  so'strong  an  influence  ovef  their  lives.  To  this 
friend  they  appeal  not  only  for  sympathy  but  advice— often 
of  the  most  extraordinary  kind — on  love  affairs,  the  education 
of  children,  business  or  domestic  difficulties,  impulses  of 
gratitude,  revelations  of  perplexing  secrets,  outcries  of  intol- 
erable pain,  coming  sometimes  from  the  very  ends  of  the 
earth,  in  a  mixture  of  tragedy  and  comedy,  to  the  silent  recip- 
ient of  these  strange  phases  of  human  life — stranger  than 
anything  he  or  she  has  ever  dared  to  put  into  any  novel.  Yet 
so  it  is ;  and  any  conscientious  author  can  but  stand  mute  and 
trembling  in  facQ  of  the  awful  responsibility  which  follows 
every  written  line. 

This,  even  of  the  ordinarily  good  books — but  what  of  the 
bad  ones  ? 

I  believe  a  thoroughly  "  bad  '*  book,  as  we  of  the  last  gen- 
eration used  to  style  such — bad  either  for  coarseness  of  style, 
as  "Tristram  Shandy,"  or  laxity  of  morals,  like  "  Don  Juan  " 
— does  infinitely  less  harm  than  many  modem  novels  which 
we  lay  on  our  drawing-room  tables,  and  let  our  young  daugh- 
ters read  ad  infinitum,  or  ad  nauseam  ;  novels,  chiefly,  I  grieve 
to  say,  written  by  women,  who,  either  out  of  pure  ignorance, 
or  a  boastful  morbid  pleasure  in  meddling  with  forbidden 
topics,  often  write  things  that  men  would  be  ashamed  to 
write. 

Absolute  wickedness,  crime  represented  as  crime,  and  licen- 
tiousness put  forward  as  licentiousness,  is  far  less  dangerous 
to  the  young  and  naturally  pure  mind  than  that  charming 
sentimental  dallying  with  sin,  which  makes  it  appear  so 
piteous,  so  interesting,  so  beautiful.  Nay,  without  even  en- 
tering upon  the  merits  of  the  favorite  modern  style  of  fiction 
— in  which  love  to  be  attractive  must  necessarily  be  unlawful 
— there  is  a  style  of  novel  in  which  right  and  wrong  are  mud-  * 


ON  NOVELS. AND  NOVEL-MAKERS,  35 ^ 

died  up  together  into  a  sort  of  neutral  tint,  the  author,  and 
consequently  the  reader,  taking  no  trouble  to  distinguish 
between  them.  The  characters  are  made  interesting,  not  by 
their  virtues  but  theij  faults ;  a  good  woman  worships  a  bad 
man,  and  vice  versa.  Now  this  may  be  true  in  real  life,  though 
I  doubt ;  but  to  present  it  in  fiction,  to  make  a  really  noble 
woman  the  abject  willing  slave  of  a  contemptible  brute  not 
worthy  to  tie  her  shoes,  or  an  honorable  man  doing  all  sorts 
of  erring  things  for  the  sake  of  a  feeble  or  vile  woman,  whom 
her  own  sex,  and  the  besj:  of  the  other,  would  heartily  despise 
—the  effect  of  such  a  picture  as  this  is  to  confuse  all  one's 
notions  of  good  and  bad,  and  produce  a  blurred  and  blotted 
vision  of  life,  which,  to  those  just  beginning  life,  is  either 
infinitely  sad  or  infinitely  harmful.  Besides,  it  is  not  true. 
Time  brings  its  revenges;  and  if  there  is  one  certainty  in  life, 
it  is  the  certainty  of  retribution — ay,  even  in  this  life:  and 
alas !  down  to  the  third  and  fourth  generation — a  creed,  by  the 
young  doubted  or  despised,  but  which  the  old,  whether  opti- 
mists or  pessimist^,  know  to  be  only  too  true. 

There  is  another  favorite -subject  of  modern  fiction  :  a  man 
or  woman  married  hastily  or  unhappily,  and  meeting  after- 
wards some  "  elective  affinity,"  the  right  man  or  woman,  or 
apparently  such.  No  doubt  this  is  a  terrible  position,  pathetic, 
tragic,  which  may  happen  to  the  most  guiltless  persons,  and 
does  happen,  perhaps,  oftener  than  any  one  knows.  Novelists 
seize  upon  it  as  a  dramatic  position,  and  paint  it  in  such  glow- 
ing, tender,  and  pathetic  colors  that,  absorbed  in  the  pity  of 
the  thing,  one  quite  forgets  its  sin.  The  hapless  lovers  rouse 
our  deepest  sympathy ;  we  follow  them  to  the  very  verge  of 
crime,  almost  regretting  that  it  is  called  crime,  and  when  the 
obnoxious  husband  or  wife  dies,  and  theiovers  are  dismissed 
to  happiness — as  is  usually  done — we  feel  quite  relieved  and 
comfortable ! 

Now,  surely  this  is  immoral,  as  immoral  as  the  coarsest 
sentence  Sh?ikespeare  ever  penned,  or  the  most  passionate 


352  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

picture  that  Shelley  or  Byron  evier  drew.  Nay,  more  so,  for 
these  are  only  nature — vicious,  undisguised,  but  natural  still, 
and  making  no  pretense  of  virtue;  but  your  sentimentalist 
assumes  a  virtue,  and  expects  sympathy  for  his  immorality, 
which  is  none  the  less  immoral  because,  God  knows,  it  is  a 
delineation  often  only  too  true,  and  perhaps  only  too  deserv- 
ing of  pity — His  pity,  who  can  see  into  the  soul  of  man. 
Many  a  condemned  thief  and  hanged  murderer  may  have 
done  the  deed  under  most  piteous  and  extenuating  circum- 
stances ;  but  theft  still  remains  theft,  and  murder  murder. 
And — let  us  not  mince  words — though  modern  taste  may 
enwrap  it  in  ever  such  pathetic,  heroic,  and  picturesque  form, 
adultery  is  still  adultery.  Never  do  our  really  great  authors 
— our  Shakespeares,  our  Scotts,  our  Thackerays,  our  George 
Eliots — deny  this,  or  leave  us  in  the  slightest  doubt  between 
virtue  and  vice.  It  is  the  mild  sentimentalists  who,  however 
they  may  resent  being  classed  with  the  "fast"  authors — alas! 
too  often  authoresses — of  modern  fiction,  are  equally  immoral ; 
because  they  hold  the  balance  of  virtue  and  vice  with  so 
feeble  and  uncertain  a  hand,  as  to  leave  both  utterly  confused, 
in  the  writer's  opinion  and  the  reader's  mind. 

But,  putting  aside  the  question  of  morality,  there  is  another 
well  deserving  the  consideration  of  novelists,  viz.,  whether 
the  subjects  they  choose  are  within  the  fair  limits  of  art? 
Legitimate  comedy  ought  to  be  based  on  humor  and  wit, 
free  from  coarseness  and  vulgarity ;  and  in  true  tragedy  the 
terrible  becomes  the  heroic  by  the  elimination  of  every  ele- 
ment which  is  merely  horrible  or  disgusting.  In  the  dying 
martyr  we  ought  to  see,  not  the  streaming  blood  or  the  shriv- 
eling of  the  burnt  flesh,  but  the  gaze  of  ecstatic  faith  into  an 
opened  heaven ;  and  the  noblest  battle  ever  represented  is 
misrepresented  when  the  artist  chooses  scenes  fit  only  for  a 
hospital  operating-table  or  a  butcher's  shambles. 

I  cannot  but  think  that  certain  modern  novels,  despite  their 
extreme  cleverness,  deal  with  topics  beyond  the  legitimate 


ON  NO  VELS  AND  NO  VEL-MAKERS.  353 

pfovince  of  fiction.  Vivid  descriptions  of  hangings,  of  prison- 
whippings;  of  tortures  inflicted  on  sane  persons  in  lunatic 
asylums,  are  not  fit  subjects  for.  art ;  at  least,  the  art  which 
can  choose  them  and  dilate  upon  them  is  scarcely  of  a  heal- 
thy kind,  or  likely  to  conduce  to  the  moral  health  of  the 
reader. 

The  answer  to  this  objection  is,  that  such  things  are ;  there- 
fore why  not  write  about  them  ?  So  must  medical  and  surgi- 
cal books  be  written ;  so  must  the  most  loathsome  details  of 
crime  and  misery  be  investigated  by  statesmen  and  political 
economists.  But  all  these  are  professional  studies  which, 
however  painful,  require  to  be  gone  through.  No  one  would 
ever  enter  into  them  as  a  matter  of  mere  amusement.  Besides, 
as  is  almost  inevitable  in  a  novel  "  with  a  purpose  "  or  one  in 
which  the  chief  interest  centers  in  some  ghastly  phase  of 
humanity,  there  is  generally  a  certain  amount  of,  perhaps 
involuntary,  exaggeration,  against  which  the  calm,  judicial 
mind  instinctively  rebels.  "Two  sides  to  every  subject;  I 
should  rather  like  to  hear  the  other  side." 

Without  holding  the  unwise  creed  that  ignorance  is  inno- 
cence, and  that  immunity  from  painful  sensations  induces 
strength  of  character,  I  still  maintain  that  these  are  topics 
which  are  best  kept  in  shadow,  especially  from  the  young.  We 
sometimes  admit  to  our  public  galleries — though  I  question 
if  we  should — the  magnificently  painted  but  gross  pictures  of 
a  few  old  masters,  and  the  realistic  horrors  upon  which  a  cer- 
tain French  school  has  made  its  fame.  But  few  of  us  would 
choose  a  Potiphar's  wife  or  a  newly-guillotined  Charlotte 
Corday  for  the  adornment  of  the  domestic  hearth.  Such  sub- 
jects, though  manipulated  by  the  most  delicate  and  yet  the 
firmest  hand,  are  apt,  either  in  art  or  literature,  to  do  more 
harm  than  the  moral  drawn  from  them  is  likely  to  do  good. 

Of  course,  the  case  may  be  argued  pretty  strongly  from  the 
other  side.  Life  is  not  all  "  roses  and  lilies  and  daffydown- 
dillies,"  therefore  why  should  fiction  represent  it  as  such ' 

L.   M.— 12. 


354  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GA  ZINE, 

Men  and  women  are  not  angels,  and  bad  people  are  often 
much  more  **  interesting  "  than  good  people  in  real  life :  why 
should  we  not  make  them  so  in  novels  ? 

I  answer,  simply  because  it  is  we  who  make  them — ^we  shortr 
sighted  mortals,  who  take  upon  us  to  paint  life,  and  can  only 
do  so  as  far  as  our  feeble  vision  allows  us  to  see  it ;  which  in 
some  of  us  is  scarcely  an  inch  beyond  our  own  nose.  Only  a 
few — but  these  are  always  the  truly  great — can  see  with  larger 
eyes,  and  reproduce  what  they  see  with  a  calm,  steady,  and 
almost  always  kindly  hand,  which  seems  like  the  hand  of  Prov- 
idence, because  its  work  is  done  with  a  belief  in  Providence — 
in  those  "  mysterious  ways  "  by  which,  soon  or  late,  ever3rthing 
— and  everybody — finds  its  own  level ;  virtue  its  reward,  and 
vice  its  retribution.  To  judge  authors  solely  by  their  works 
is  not  always  fair,  because  most  people  put  their  best  s6lves 
into  their  books,  which  are  the  cream  of  their  life,  and  the 
residuum  may  be  but  skimmed  milk  for  daily  use.  But,  in  the 
department  of  fiction  at  least,  the  individual  character  gives 
its  stamp  to  every  page.  Not  all  good  novelists  may  be  ideal 
men  and  women,  but  I  doubt  much  if  any  really  immoral 
man,  or  irreligious  woman,  ever  made  a  good  novelist. 

I  wish  not  to  malign  my  brethren.  Most  of  them  do  their 
best,  and  I  think  we  may  fairly  decline  to  believe  such  stories 
as  that  of  the  "  popular  authoress  "  who,  having  starved  as  a 
moral,  prosy,  and  altogether  unpopular  authoress  for  several 
seasons,  was  advised  to  try  "  spicy  **  writing,  and  now  makes 
her  thousands  a  year.  And  even  sifter  weeding  from  our 
ranks  the  "fast,"  the  sentimental,  the  ghastly,  the  feeble  and 
prosy,  the  clap-trap  and  altogether  silly  school,  there  still 
remains  a  good  number  of  moderately  clever  and  moderately 
wholesome  writers  of  fiction,  who  redeem  our  literature  from 
disgrace,  or  could  do  so  if  they  chose — if  they  could  be  made 
to  feel  themselves  responsible,  not  to  man  onl}%  but  to  God 
"  For  every  idle  word  that  men  shall  say  " — (how  much  more 
write  ?) — "  they  shall  answer  in  the  day  of  judgment." 


1' 


ON  NO  VELS  AND  NO  VEL-MAKERS,  355 

To  us,  who  are  old  enough  to  have  read  pretty  thoroughly 
the  book  of  human  life  it  matters  little  what  we  read  in  mere 
novels,  which  are  at  best  a  poor  imaginary  imitation  of  what 
we  have  studied  as  a  solemn  reality ;  but  to  the  young  it  mat- 
ters a  great  deal.  Impressions  are  made,  lessons  taught,  and 
influences  given,  which,  whether  for  good  or  for  evil,  nothing 
can  afterwards  efface  The  parental  yearning,  which  only  par- 
ents can  understand,  is  to  save  our  children  from  all  we  can 
—alas,  how  little !  They  must  enter  upon  the  battle  of  life  ; 
the  utmost  we  can  do  is  to  give  them  their  armor  and  show 
them  how  to  fight.  But  what  wise  father  or  mother  would 
thrust  them,  unarmed,  into  a  premature  conflict,  putting  into 
their  pure  minds  sinful  thoughts  that  had  never  been  there 
before,  and  sickening  their  tender  hearts  by  needless  horrors 
which  should  only  be  faced  by  those  who  deal  with  evil  for 
the  express  purpose  of  amending  it }  Truly,  there  are  certain 
novels  which  I  have  lately  read,  which  I  would  no  more  think 
of  leaving  about  on  my  drawing-room  table,  than  1  would  take 
my  son  to  a  casino  in  order  to  teach  him  morals,  or  make  my 
daughter  compassionate-hearted  by  sending  her  to  see  a 
Spanish  bull-fight. 

Finally,  as  an  example  in  proof  of  many,  almost  all,  the 
arguments  and  theories  here  advanced,  I  would  advise  any 
one  who  hks  gone  through  a  course  of  modern  fiction,  to  go 
through  another,  considered  a  little  out  of  date,  except  by  the 
old,  and,  I  am  glad  to  say,  the  very  young.  Nothing  shows 
more  clearly  the  taste  of  the  uncorrupted  healthy  palate  for 
wholesome  food,  than  the  eagerness  with  which  almost  all 
children,  or  children  passing  into  young  people,  from  thirteen 
and  upwards,  devour  the  Waverley  novels.  A  dozen  pages, 
taken  at^  random  this  moment  from  a  volume  which  a  youth- 
ful reader,  I  might  say  gormandizer,  has  just  laid  down,  will 
instance  what  I  mean. 

It  is  the  story  of  Nancy  Ewart,  told  by  himself  to  Alan  Fair- 
ford,  on  board  the  Jumping  Jenny,  in  **  Redgauntlet."    Herein 


3 $6  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

the  author  touches  deepest  tragedy,  blackest  crime,  and  sharp- 
est pathos  (instance  the  Hne  where  Nanty  suddenly  stops 
short  with  "  Poor  Jess ! ").  He  deals  with  elements  essentially 
human,  even  vicious ;  his  hero  is  a  "  miserable  sinner,"  no 
doubt  of  that,  either  in  the  author's  mind,  or  the  impression 
conveyed  to  that  of  the  reader.  There  is  no  paltering  with 
vice,  no  sentimental  glossing  over  of  sin ;  the  man  is  a  bad 
man,  at  least  he  has  done  evil,  and  his  sin  has  found  him  out, 
yet  we  pity  him.  Though  handling  pitch  we  are  not  defiled; 
however  and  whatever  our  author  paints,  it  is  never  with  an 
uncertain  or  feeble  touch.  We  give  him  our  hand  and  are  led 
by  him  fearlessly  into  the  very  darkest  places,  knowing  that 
he  carries  the  light  with  him  and  that  no  harm  will  come.  I 
think  it  is  Hot  too  much  to  say  that  we  might  go  through  the 
Waverley  Novels  from  beginning  to  end,  without  finding  one 
page,  perhaps  not  even  one  line,  that  we  would  hesitate  to 
read  aloud  to  any  young  people,  old  enough  to  understand 
that  evil  exists  in  the  world,  and  that  the  truly  virtuous  are 
those  who  know  how  to  refuse  the  evil  and  to  choose  the 
good.  And  I — who  having  written  novels  all  my  life,  know 
more  than  most  readers  how  to  admire  a  great  novelist — 
should  esteem  it  a  good  sign  of  any  son  or  daughter  of  mine 
who  would  throw  a  whole  cart-load  of  modern  fiction  into  the 
gutter,  often  its  fittest  place,  in  order  to  clasp  a  huge  whole- 
some armful  of  Walter  Scott. 

From  "  Good  Words." 


HOW  TO  READ  BOOKS. 

A  TALK  WITH  CHILDREN. 

Have  you  ever  thought  of  the  great  pleasure  that  is  to  bo 
gained  from  reading?     Have  you  ever  tried  to  imagine  whut 
life  would  be  to  you  if  there  were  no  books  in  the  world,  or 
you  could  not  read  ?    Every  child  knows,  I  hope,  the  joy  of 


y 


HOW  TO  READ  BOOKS,  357 

having  a  true  friend,  whose  company  is  dear  to  him,  who  can 
be  interested  in  what  he  is  interested,  no  matter  whether  it  be 
work  or  play.  Now  a  book  is  not  quite  like  a  f fiend.  The 
author  can  talk  to  us  as  he  pleases  ;  he  can  make  us  sorrowful 
or  glad  ;  he  can  make  us  cry  or  laugh  ;  he  can  give  us  knowl- 
edge and  he  can  make  us  think  ;  but  we  cannot  talk  back  to 
him,'  we  cannot  tell  him  what  we  feel,  and  he  cannot  sympa- 
thize with  us  as  a  friend  can.  On  the  other  hand,  friends  may 
change  ;  they  may  go  far  away  ;  they  may  cease  to  care  about 
the  things  we  care  for.  Book's  cannot  change,  though  our 
interest  in  therh  may  ;  and  if  they  are  great  and  good  books — 
for  there  are  bad  books,  just  as  there  are  false  friends — it  is 
impossible  to  know  them  too  well  or  read  them  tod  often. 

I  dare  say  you  have  heard  people  speak  of  a  taste  for  read- 
ing. Some  children  read  greedily  any  book  that  comes  in 
their  way.  A  biography,  a  volume  of  travels,  a  poem,  a  his- 
tory, even  a  cookery-book  will  attract  their  attention,  and  be 
read  from  the  first  page  to  the  last.  I  even  knew  a  boy  who 
found  inexhaustible  pleasure  in  the  study  of  Bradshaw's  Rail- 
way Guide.  Such  little  people  have,  no  doubt,  a  taste  for 
reading.  But  this  taste,  to  be  of  mucKgood,  needs  to  be  cul- 
tivated. A  child  may  have  what  is  called  a  natural  ear  for 
music  ;  but  this  will  never  make  him  a  good  musician.  He 
must  be  taught  his  notes,  and  learn  a  great  deal  besides,  before 
his  ear  for  music  will  prove  of  much  service.  Just  so  does 
the  young  book-reader  need  training  in  order  that  he  may 
read  wisely.  Now  I  shall  try  and  tell  you,  as  well  as  I  can  in 
a  few  pages,  how  to  read,  and  the  good  that  is  to  be  gained 
from  reading ;  but  there  is  something  to  be  said  first.  You 
must  learn — 

How  to  use  Books. — Books  deserve  to  be  treated  with  care. 
Think  of  the  labor  it  has  cost  to  produce  them  !  The  author's 
head-work  is  the  hardest  labor  of  all ;  but  the  paper-maker, 
the  printer,  the  binder,  the  publisher,  and  sometimes  the  art- 
ist, have  each  to  use  brains  and  hands  in  the  making  of  a  book 


3S8        '  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

If  it  be  a  good  book,  which  our  poet  Milton  calls  "  the  precious 
life-blood  of  a  master-spirit,"  no  toil  is  too  great  to  expend 
upon  it.  If  the  words  are  beautiful,  so  also  should  be  the 
form,  and  many  of  our  publishers' take  delight  in  bringing  out 
editions  of  famous  poets  and  prose  writers  that  it,  is  a  luxury 
to  handle  and  to  read.  Now,  not  only  books  like  these,  but 
every  book  we  read,  should  be  used  in  a  careful  manner.  We 
are  gentle  towards  everything  we  love,  and  people  who  love 
books  will  be  sure  to  treat  them  gently.  Here  are  four  rules 
to  remember — i.   Never  turn  ^own   the  leaves  of  a  book. 

2.  Never  play  with  the  leaves  so  that  they  become  dog-eared. 

3.  Never  read  a  book  with  dirty  or  inky  fingers.  4.  Never  place 
a  book  upon  the  table  face  downwards,  lest  you  should  crack 
the  binding.  A  book  that  has  been  well  read  will  no  doubt 
show  signs  of  use  ;  but  if  it  have  been  read  with  proper  care, 
it  will  not  show  signs  of  neglect. 

Suitable  Books, — Young  children  with  a  craving  for  books 
cannot  always  gratify  their  special  tastes,  but  must  be  con- 
tent with  what  they  find  in  the  family  bookcase.  Pious  peo- 
ple, who  really  want  to  do  children  good,  will  sometimes  give 
them  tracts  or  little  books  which  teach  them  what  a  wicked 
world  they  live  in,  an5  how — ^which  is,  indeed,  quite  true — 
pain  and  sorrow  and  death  are  evils  common  to  all  men.  A 
happy,  healthy  child,  who  has  been  taught  to  love  his  heavehly 
Father,  who  enjoys  the  sunshine  and  the  flowers  and  feels  his 
life  in  every  limb,  may  read  books  of  this  kind,  and  for  a  mo- 
ment be  made  unhappy  by  them  ;  but  he  looks  up  to  see  his 
mother's  smile,  or  he  runs  out  into  the  fields  and  hears  the 
birds  singing,,  and  the  belief  that  he  has  been  born  into  a 
happy  world  is  once  more  strong  within  him.  The  tracts,  you 
see,  make  no  impression,  because  they  are  not  fitting  food  for 
a  joyous  child  ;  and  just  so,  books  that  will  do  you  good  ser- 
vice must  be  books  you  can  partially  understand  and  appre- 
ciate. I  say  partially^  because  it  is  not  necessary  you  should  J 
understand  all  a  book  teaches  in  order  to  gain  delight  from  it 


HOW  TO  HEAD  BOOKS,  359 

and  wisdom  s^lso.  It  is  a  gre^t  pity  when  a  boy  or  girl  who 
really  likes  reading  is  forced  to  read  dull  books  or  books  that 
are  unsuitable.  And  it  is  a  terrible  pity  when  all  the  litera- 
ture open  to  boys  and  girls  is  of  a  trivial,  feeble  sort,  or  worse 
still,  of  a  corrupting  character.  Happily  good  books  for  the 
'  young  are  numerous,  and  there  are  few  children,  whether  in 
country  or  town,  that  have  not  access  to  some  well  selected 
parish  library. 

The  Bible. — And  here,  perhaps,  I  may  remind  you  that  there 
is  one  book  good  for  all  ages  and  for  all  circumstances  in  life. 
The  first  book  an  English  child  will  learn  to  read  is  the  Bible 
—that  is  to  say.  The  Book  which  ranks  above  all  other  books 
as  containing  the  word  of  God.  It  would  be  easy  to  fill  these 
pages  with  good  words  about  the  Bible  ;  but  that  is  not  my 
object  now.  All  I  want  to  say  is  that,  apart  from  the  great 
purpose  with  which  it  has  been  given  to  us,  this  book,  or 
rather  these  books,  for  the  Bible  consists  of  many  volumes 
composed  in  different  ages  by  historians,  prophets,  poets  and 
apostles — this  book,  I  say,  is  the  most  interesting  that  has 
ever  been  written.  There  is,  no  doubt,  much  in  it  hard  to  be 
understood ;  but  there  is  much  more  which  a  child  can  under- 
stand and  enjoy.  The  beautiful  Old-Testament  stories  of 
Abraham,  Isaac  and  Jacob,  of  Samuel  and  David,  of  Elijah 
and  Daniel,  are  told  in  our  translation  of  the  Bible  in  the  most 
beautiful  English  that  was  ever  written.  Then  in  Job,  the 
book  of  Psalms,  and  the  prophecies  of  Isaiah,  we  have  the 
devout  thoughts  of  good  men  expressed  in  the  highest  strain 
of  poetry  ;  and  passing  on  from  these,  we  come  to  the  simple 
g:ospel  story — the  story  of  glad  tidings — ^with  our  Lord's  par- 
ables and  precepts,  his  gracious  deeds  and  divine  words,  fol- 
lowed by  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  and  the  letters  they  wrote 
to  the  first  Christian  disciples.  Our  English  Bible  is  not  only 
the  first  book  that  should  be  read  by  the  child,  because  it 
tells  him  what  no  other  book  can,  but  because  it  is  the  key  to 
so  many  other  good  books — that  is  to  say,  it  opens  them  and 


360    \  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

makes  them  plain.  Nobody  who  has  read  this  wonderful  book 
carefully  and  who  loves  the  wise  and  beautiful  lessons  it  con- 
tains, will  like  to  read  what  is  coarse  and  evil,  fee  will  have  a 
taste  for  something  better. 

Two  Words  explained, — You  will  all  have  seen  the  word  "  lit- 
erature," but  probably  you  would  find  it  difficult  to  tell  me 
what  it  means.  I  must  try  and  explain.the  term  as  well  as  I 
can.  First  of  all,  I  will  tell  you  what  it  is  not.  Books  have 
been  written  upon  every  subject  in  which  men  are  interested. 
The  architect,  the  engineer,  the  lawyer,  the  doctor  consult 
books  that  will  help  them  in  their  professions ;  but  lawbooks, 
and  medical  books,  and  books  on  architecture — books  written 
for  a  special  class — are  not  literature.  On  the  other  hand> 
books  written  in  verse  or  prose  that  awaken  thought,  that 
give  solace  and  delight,  and  lift  us  above  the  narrow  round  of 
our  daily  life — books  that  make  us  happier,  wiser,  even  merrier 
— are  books  that  deserve  to  be  called  literature.  Our  poets, 
our  historians,  our  essayists,  our  novelists,  the  travelers  who 
describe  what  they  have  seen  in  different  parts'  of  the  world, 
the  critics  who  write  about  books  and  show  us  their  faults  and 
beauties,  have  all  contribilted  to  build  up  what  we  call*  our 
national  literature,  by  which  we  mean  the  literature  produced 
by  Englishmen.  Every  great  people  has  produced  a  noble 
literature,  and  this  is,  indeed,  one  of  the  chief  signs  of  its 
greatness.  We  read  the  literature  of  the  Jews  in  the  books 
which  form  our  Bible  ;  ancient  Greece  produced  a  literature 
unequaled  in  Europe  to  this  day  for  beauty  of  language  and 
wealth  of  thought ;  Rome,  that  once  ruled  the  world,  did 
so  first  by  the  sword,  then  by  her  laws,  and  then  by  the  poets 
and  historians  who  have  made  the  Latin  language  so  famous. 
Modern  nations,  too — such  as  Germany,  France  and  Italy— can 
each  boast  a  national  literature  ;  but  not  one  of  these  coun- 
tries has  a  literature  equal  to  that  which  is  open  to  readers  of 
the  English  language.  Here,  then,  is  a  vast  store-house  foU 
to  overflowing  of  precious  treasures,  and  thewealtk  piled  «¥ 


HO  IV  TO  READ  BOOKS.  361 

may  so  puzzle  the  youth  who  looks  in  at  the  door,  that  he 
will  perhaps  hesitate  to  enter.  What  can  he  do  ?  he  may  ask  ; 
how  can  he  best  use  the  good  gifts  that  wise  and  great  Eng- 
lishmen have  left  for  his  service  ?  In  reply  to  this  question 
I  must  explain  to  you  another  word,  and  that  word  is  Cul- 
ture. You  know  the  difference  between  land  in  its  natural 
state  and  land  that  has  been  drained  and  manured,  that  has 
felt  the  plowshare  and  the  harrow ;  you  know,  too,  the  dif- 
ference between  the  flowers  of  our  woods  and  fields  and  the 
flowers  that  grow  in  a  well-cared-for  garden.  Some  sort  of 
difference  like  this  may  be  seen  between  people  whose  minds 
have  been  allowed  to  run  wild  and  people  whose  minds  are 
carefully  cultivated.  The  contrast,  however,  is  not  quite  com- 
plete, because  nature  however  wild,  and  flowers  however  un- 
tended,  are  always  beautiful ;  but  there  is  no  beauty  in  a  mind 
that  like  the  garden  of  the  sluggard,  contains  nothing  save 
wild  briars,  thistles  and  thorns.  In  order,  then,  to  read  books 
so  as  to  get  good  out  of  them,  the  mind  needs  culture,  which 
is  not  mere  knowledge,  although  that  is  very  needful,  but  the 
power  of  seeing  what  is  good  and  wise  in  a  book,  and  reject- 
ing what  is  feeble  and  false.  This  power  cannot  be  acquired 
off-hand  like  a  lesson.  Some  people,  although  they  may  read 
a  great  deal,  never  gain  this  gift,  never  know  how  to  use  their 
reading  wisely.  They  have  a  confused  notion  of  many  things, 
but  they  know  nothing  thoroughly,  partly  because  they  have 
never  had  the  training  so  necessary  in  early  life,  and  partly 
because  they  read  books  in  a  sleepy,  stupid  way,  content  to 
be  amused,  and  not  wishing  to  learn.  Reading,  you  will  see, 
may  be  the  idlest  of  pastimes,  a  pursuit  followed  from  mere 
indolence  and  emptiness  of  mind.  I  am  writing,  however,  for 
boys  and  girls  who  want  to  know  how  to  read,  and  for  them  a 
few  hints  shall  be  given  that  may  prove  generally  useful. 

Reading  with  a  Purpose. — Some  of  the  children  who  read 
these  pages  will  have  visited  the  British  Museum,  but  few 
probably  have  entered  the  reading  room  with  its  splendid 


362  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

dome  and  vast  shelves  of  books.  Those  who  may  have  done 
so  will  have  been  told  that  the  books  they  see  are  but  few  in 
comparison  with  the  number  contained  in  that  immense 
library.  Now  it  is  evident  that  if  a  man  were  to  read  in  that 
room  every  day  and  all  day  through  a  long  life,  the  books  he 
read  would  be  insignificant  in  number  v/hen  compared  with  the 
volumes  stored  up  in  the  nruseum.  What  then  does  the  stu- . 
dent  do,  who  wants  to  make  good  use  of  that  great  library  ? 
He  selects  a  subject,  and  chooses  books  that  will  tell  him 
what  he  wants  to  know  on  that  subject.  And  just  in  the  same 
way  the  boy  or  girl  who  loves  reading,  and  wishes  to  gain 
from  it  something  more  than  mere  amusement,  must  choose 
some  subject — that  is  to  say,  he  must  read  with  a  purpose. 
Mind  I  do  not  say  that  amusement  is  not  sometimes  a  suffi- 
cient reason  for  taking  up  a  book.  We  cannot  be  always  wise,, 
and  a  capital  story-book — a  book  for  example  like  **  Alice  in 
Wonderland,"  or  "  Cast  up  by  the  Sea,"  is  as  good  a  recreation 
for  a  child  on  a  rainy  day  as  a  game  of  cricket  or  rounders 
when  the  sun  is  shining.  As  you  grow  up  you  will,  I  hope, 
read  a  number  of  stories,  and  among  others,  the  stories  written 
by  Sir  Walter  §cott,  which  are  so  pure,  so  wise,  so  beautiful, 
that  young  people,  and  old  people  too,  will  be  happier  and 
better  for  reading  them.  The  boy  or  girl  who  does  not  love 
a  good  tale  will  not  often  be  found  to  care  for  books  of  any 
kind. 

But  if  reading  for  amusement  is  an  easy  and  pleasant  thing 
to  do  in  leisure  moments,  reading  with  a  purpose  requires 
resolution  and  courage.  Without  these  virtues  neither  boy 
nor  man  will  do  much  good  in  Hfe,  and  therefore  it  is  well  to 
remember,  even  in  early  years,  that  nothing  of  lasting  value 
can  be  acquired  without  labor.  There  is  no  doubt  plenty  of 
reading  that  needs  no  thought,  but  then  it  does  no  good,  and 
only  serves,  as  people  say,  to  kill  time — a  horrible  expression 
when  you  come  to  think  about  it.  To  get  good  from  a  book 
you  must  feel  a  thorough  interest  in  it.    A  boy  who  keeps 


HOW  TO  READ  BOOKS,  ''    363 

pigeons  and  is  fond  of  them  will  read  with  great  eagerness  any 
book  that  tells  him  about  those  birds ;  and  you  may  be  sure 
that  when  he  reaches  the  end  of  that  book  he  will  have 
learned  all  it  has  to  teach  him.  And  the  reason  is  plain.  The 
boy  is  interested  in  his  subject,  he  wants  to  gain  knowledge, 
and  this  desire  makes  it  pleasant  to  acquire  it.  So  you  see  he 
has  been  reading  with  a  purpose. 

A  Plan  for  Reading. — The  young  reader  who  is  beginning 
to  understand  the  importance  of  reading  is  apt  to  waste  the 
time  which  he  is  really  wishing  to  improve.  Now  it  is  impos- 
sible to  give  him  all  the  advice  that  might  be  of  use  to  him  in 
this  difficulty,  but  I  will  give  him  one  hint  that  may  be  service- 
able, and  one  which  an  intelligent  boy  or  girl  can  follow  to 
some  extent  alone,  and  may  follow  easily  with  the  help  of  a 
master. 

I  will  suppose  that  the  student  has  already  some  knowledge 
of  English  history,  and  especially  of  that  history  from  the  time 
of  the  Reformation,  when  a  new  era  began  in  these  islands. 
Whatever  is  really  noble  in  English  literature  (with  the  excep- 
tion of  the  poetry  of  Chaucer,  who  ranks  among  our  greatest 
poets  and  lived  in  the  fourteenth  century)  dates  from  the  latter 
part  of  the  sixteenth  century,  so  that  speaking  roughly  we 
may  say  that  all  the  famous  books  England  has  given  to  the 
world  have  been  given  within  three  hundred  years.  Suppose 
then  that  we  make  our  starting  point  the  reign  of  Queen 
Elizabeth.  If  the  chief  events  of  that  interesting  reign  are 
known  to  the  young  reader,  he  will  have  learned  from  it,  or 
rather  this  knowledge  will  come  with  riper  age,  that  though 
our  ancestors  had  many  faults  in  those  days  (different,  but  not 
perhaps  worse  faults  than  we  exhibit  now),  they  had  also 
splendid  virtues,  courage,  self-denial,  the  love  of  enterprise,  the 
love  of  country,  faith  in  themselves  "and  in  God.  The  books 
people  write  are  an  index  to  character,  and  the  books 
written  during  the  reigns  of  Queen  Elizabeth  and  James  I. 
show  the  character  of  that  age.    Therefore  you  will  see  that 


364  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

the  actions  of  that  time,  as  described  by  the  historian,  and  tlie 
words  of  that  time,  uttered  in  Hterary  form  by  poets  and  other 
writers,  serve  to  illustrate  each  other.  Study  carefully  then 
the  history  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  and  that  of  her  successor, 
store  up  in  your  memory  the  principal  dates  and  events,  and 
then  when  these  are  familiar  read  some  of  the  best  books,  or 
selections  from  the  best  books,  written  during  that  period, 
and  learn  the  most  important  facts  in  the  authors'  lives. 
This  advice  is  not,  of  course,  intended  for  very  young  children, 
but  boys  and  girls  of  twelve  years  old  and  upwards  should 
not  find  it  difficult  to  follow.  They  might  read  some  of  Shake- 
speare's plays,  some  beautiful  passages  from  Spenser's  "  Fairie 
Queene,"  and  many  of  the  lovely  songs  and  lyrics  written  in 
that  golden  age  of  English  poetry ;  and  they  might  read,  and 
could  not  fail  to  read  with  pleasure,  the  lives  of  the  brave 
soldiers,  sailors,  and  travelers  who  helped  to  make  that  age 
so  famous — the  lives,  for  instance,  of  Drake  and  Frobisher 
of  Sir  Philip  Sidney  and  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  which  have 
all  been  written,  and  written  extremely  well,  by  modern 
writers.  It  was  the  age  of  adventure,  and  the  daring  deeds  of 
English  seamen  were  as  famous  then  as  they  have  been  in 
later  years.  Read  what  those  men  did,  and  you  will  say  that 
they  were  men  of  whom  Wolfe  and  Nelson  and  Collingwood 
might  well  have  been  proud.  Read  about  the  Elizabethan 
heroes  in  the  first  place,  and  then  if  you  read  the  life  of  Lord 
Nelson,  so  beautifully  told  by  Southey,  or  the  life  of  the  good 
and  brave  Collingwood,  or  the  lives  of  Wellington,  Lawrence, 
and  Havelock,  whose  brave  doings  should  be  known  to  every 
English  child,  you  will  learn  how  the  spirit  that  animated  the 
men  who  fought  and  labored  for  England  three  hundred  years 
ago  has  inspired  also  the  splendid  deeds  achieved  in  our  own 
century.  Thus  you  can  see  that  books  will  not  only  tell  you 
what  has  been  done  by  famous  Englishmen  in  days  gone  by, 
but  may  also  call  forth  one  of  the  noblest  of  virtues — patriot- 
ism, or  the  love  of  country.    And  no  man  who  loves  Englai»l 


r 


ffOlV  TO  READ  BOOKS,  "  36J 


no  child  who  has  learned  to  be  proud  of  his  English  birthright, 
will  do  aught  that  can  disgrace  the  English  name.  The  more 
you  know  of  this  dear  island — "this  precious  stone  set  in  the 
silver  sea  " — the  better  will  you  love  it,  and  this  knowledge, 
remember,  is  to  be  chiefly  gained  by  books.  You  will  under- 
stand now,  I  think,  how  close  is  the  connection  between  the 
history  of  a  country  and  its  literature — between  the  heroes,, 
martyrs,  and  statesmen,  who  have  fought,  bled,  and  labored 
for  their  country's  welfare,  and  the  poets  and  historians  who 
have  sung  their  praises  or  recorded  their  acts. 

One  or  two  words  more  must  be  added  here.-  You  will  see 
that  the  plan  of  reading  suggested  may  be  followed  through 
any  reign,  or  any  portion  of  a  reign,  but  though  system  in 
reading  is  good,  it  is  not  necessary  to  follow  it  too  strictly. 
Sometimes  it  may  be  best  to  read  the  book  that  comes  easiest 
to  hand,  and  a  good  book,  remember,  may  be  read  and  read 
and  read  again,  and  each  time  with  greater  benefit.  What 
child  ever  grew  tired  of  "  Robinson  Crusoe  "  or  the  "  Pilgrim's 
Progress  ? "  what  man  that  loves  reading  can  grow  weary  of 
Shakespeare  or  of  Scott }  The  number  of  books  and  cheap 
magazines  printed  in  our  day  may  tempt  a  young  reader  to 
be  indolent,  and  to  pass  from  one  to  another  as  a  butterfly 
from  flower  to  flower  without  mastering  any.  A  few  books 
well  chosen  and  well  read  will  be  better  than  many  books 
glanced  at  carelessly.  A  sensible  man.  Sir  Thomas  Powell 
Buxton,  advised  his  son  not  to  take  up  any  book  without 
reading  it  to  the  end.  The  advice  may  have  been  good  for 
Buxton's  Son,  but  it  is  not  good  in  all  cases,  and  might  disgust 
some  young  readers  altogether.  For  different  minds  not  only 
is  different  food  needed,  but  it  must  be  taken  in  a  different 
way.  Variety  is  more  necessary  in  some  cases  than  in  others, 
but  all  minds — ^young  minds  as  well  as  old — need  discipline ; 
and  if  it  be  enough  for  the  student  to  taste  certain  books,  it 
is  only  when  other  books  are  patiently  studied  and  inwardly 
digested.  ^ 


3.66    '  \  THE  LJBRAR  V  MA  GAZINE. 

How  to  Remember  What  is  Read. — I  have  said  that  we  do 
not  easily  forget  what  we  read  on  a  subject  that  greatly  inter- 
ests us.  A  man  who  is  told  that  some  one  has  left  him  a  large 
sum  of  money  is  sure  not  to  forget  that  news.  A  boy  who 
has  the  promise  of  a  cricket-bat  will  not  forget  that  promise. 
And  so  you  see  there  is  a  connection  between  a  strong  inter- 
est and  a  good  memory.  It  is  generally  true  that  ^  man  who 
loves  poetry  remembers  poetry ;  that  the  man  with  a  strong 
curiosity  to  learn  the  facts  of  histor)'^  remembers  those*facts; 
and  it  may  be  safely  said  that  the  child  wh9se  interest  is 
thoroughly  aroused  in  any  subject  is  certain  to  recollect  what 
he  reads  about  it.  There  are  many  things  it  is  necessary  to 
know  which  cannot  attract  a  child.  These  must  be  learned 
by  heart ;  and  as  the  memory,  like  every  other  faculty,  grows 
stronger  by  exercise,  it  is  well  that  it  should  be  thus  used  in 
early  life.  Useful  facts,  such  as  dates,  if  stored  in  the  mem- 
ory while  young,  will  be  fresh  for  use  in  after  days,  and  in  all 
future  reading  they  will  be  found  of  service.  There  are  other 
ways  in  which  the  memory  may  be  strengthened ;  and  no 
doubt  the  young  reader  will  agree  with  me  that  if  not  more 
useful  these  ways  are  more  agreeable  than  the  dull  storing  up 
of  figures.  Suppose,  for  instance,  that  after  reading  a  charm- 
ing tale  you  shut  the  volunje  and  try  to  tell  the  story  to  your 
brothers  and  sisters.  This  may,  no  doubt,  be  difficult  at  first; 
but  the  labor  will  soon  become  a  pleasure,  and  the  effort  to 
recall  the  tale  will  so  fix  it  in  your  mind  that  many  a  long 
year  afterwards  it  will  be  still  remembered.  This  is  one  hint 
to  the  boy  or  girl  bent  upon  self-improvement ;  and  I  need 
scarcely  add  that  the  endeavor  to  write  down  in  simple  lan- 
guage an  account  of  what  has  been  read  is  another  way  of 
strengthening  the  memory.  Indeed,  it  is  something  more, 
and  may  be  a  lesson  in  English  composition,  which  is,  you 
know,  the  art  of  writing  English. 

Reading  Aloud, — ^The  art  of  reading  aloud  should  be  prac- 
ticed by  every  reader.    A  book  read  in  a  clear  voice,  with 


f 


HOW  TO  READ  BOOKS.  3^7 

proper  emphasis  and  feeling,  seems  quite  different  from  the. 
same  book  read  in  a  sing-song  drawl.  The  noblest  words 
ever  written  are  likely  to  fall  upon  deaf  ears  whBn  read  as 
task  work  and  without  animation.  The  mind  of  the  reader  does 
not  come  into  contact  with  the  mind  of  the  writer  ;  and  so  the 
thoughts  uttered,  however  beautiful  and  worthy,  make  little 
if  any  impression  on  those  who  hear  them.  Every  child  will 
have  noticed  this  in  a  church.  One  clergyman  has  read  the 
words  of  Bible  or  Prayer-book  so  as  to  compel  him  to  listen  : 
another  has  read  the  same  words  so  as  to  send  him  to  sleep. 
To  read  well  you  must  understand  and  feel  what  you  are 
reading,  and  the  more  alive  with  meaning  the  words  are  to 
you  the  better  will  you  utter  them.  Thus  a  good  reader  not 
only  makes  his  hearers  understand  the  books  he  reads  but 
proves  by  his  clearness  of  utterance  and  modulation  of  tone 
that  he  understands  it  well  himself. 

A  good  voice  is  what  we  call  a  gift  of  nature  and  the  charm 
of  its  sweetest  tones  cannot  be  acquired ;  but  the  voice  is  so 
flexible  an  organ,  that,  however  naturally  defective,  it  can  be 
trained  and  improved,  and  every  young  person  may  learn  the 
art  of  elocution,  or  of  distinct  and  forcible  utterance,  which  is 
essential  to  good  reading.  Poetry  and  rhythmical  prose,  that 
is  to  say,  prose  that  moves  in  a  kind  of  harmonious  measure, 
should  be  read  aloud,  and  if  possible  in  the  open  air.  Let  thq 
boy  or  girl  begin  by  a  clear  and  energetic  recitation  of  such 
stirring  verses  as  Drayton's  "Agincourt,"  Scott's  "Flodden 
Field,"  Campbell's  "  Hohenlinden,"  Macaulay's  "  Lays,"  and 
Tennyson's  "  Charge  of  the  Light  Brigade."  From  these  he 
might  pass  on  to  descriptive  and  pathetic  poetry — to  the  in- 
comparable "  Elegy  "  of  Gray,  to  Goldsmith's  "  Traveler  "  and 
"Deserted  Village,"  to  "  Wordsworth's  loveliest  lyrics,  and  to 
the  many  noble  passages  in  Shakespeare  which  are  fitted  for 
recitation.  And  lastly,  let  him  turn  to  the  sublime  and  unap- 
proachable harmony  of  Milton,  whose  majestic  verse,  although 
perhaps  but  dimly  understood,  will  fill  the  ear  and  gladden 


368  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE. 

.  the  heart  with  its  enchanting  music  and  superb  beauty  of  form. 
Every  word  in  the  works  of  a  great  poet  has  a  special  mean- 
ing, and  so  you  will  see  how  necessary  it  is  that  every  word 
should  receive  due  attention  from  the  reader.  In  reading 
prose  it  is  possible  to  slur  over  words,  to  clip  them,  and  to 
treat  them  with  something  like  contempt,  but  in  reading 
verse  this  is  not  so  easy  to  do,  and  therefore  it  will  be  well  to 
study  the  art  of  reading  aloud  through  the  help  of  our  great 
poets.  And,  in  order  to  succeed  in  this  accomplishment,  it  is 
advisable — 1  had  almost  said  necessary — to  commit  poetry  to 
memory.  Thus  only  will  it  become  a  part,  as  it  were,  of  your 
mental  property,  and  only  by  this  familiarity  with  poetical 
words  and  imagery  will  you  be  able  to  read  poetry  as  it  de- 
serves to  be  read.  It  is  not  necessary  to  do  more  than  men- 
tion the  conspicuous  faults  of  bad  readers.  Some  read  as  if 
they  were  crying,  although  the  subject  may  be  the  merriest 
in  the  world;  some  whine  and  some  drawl;  some  assume  an 
artificial  sort  of  voice,  altogether  unlike  the  voice  in  which  they 
talk  to  a  friend  ;  some  lay  an  emphasis  on  the  wrong  words; 
some  mumble  their  words  so  indistinctly,  and  read  in  such  a 
monotonous  tone,  that  it  is  impossible  to  listen  to  them,  with 
patience.  Remember,  then,  in  reading  aloud,  to  avoid  all  tire- 
some effort.  Be  natural ;  speak  with  clearness  ;  understand 
and  feel  what  you  read ;  and  you  can  hardly  fail  to  read  well. 
And  now,  before  I  end  this  "  talk,"  let  me  remind  you  that 
it  is  possible  to  be  a  slave  even  to  books.  Books  cannot  be 
loved  too  well,  but  they  must  be  loved  wisely.  Spme  young 
people  live  in  a  kind  of  book-world,  and  fojget  the  living 
world  around  them,  and  older  people  become  sometimes  so 
absorbed  in  the  imaginary  griefs  of  characters  in  novels  as 
to  disregard  the  real  troubles  of  their  friends  and  neighbors. 
This  is  not  making  a  good  use  of  books.  Then,  if  books  so 
occupy  you  that  you  do  not  care  about  the  beautiful  world  in 
which  you  are  living,  it  is  a.  sign  that  you  are  not  using  them 
to  good  purpose.    The  mountains  and  woods,  the   sky  an< 


;o 


WILLIAM  PRE  SCO  TT  AT  B  UNKER  HILL.         3^9 

ocean,  the  birds  and  flowers  have  a  thousand  voices ;  but  it  is 
possible  to  close  our  ears  against  them,  and  to  despise  that 
Book  of  Nature  which  is  open  to  every  one  and  has  a  lesson 
for  all.  Yet  remember  that  other  books  are  great  and  pure 
and  noble,  in  proportion  as  they  make  us  see  more  clearly  and 
enjoy  more  thankfully  the  glories  displayed  in  this  infinitely 
wonderful  book,  of  which  David  speaks  so  well  in  the  nine- 
teenth Psalm  and  in  the  one  hundred  and  fourth  Psalm. 
Many  and  many  a  lesson  must  be  learned  about  this  world 
which  books  cannot  convey,  and  the  proof  of  what  a  man 
knows  and  can  do  is  not  always  to  be  tested  by  his  book- 
knowledge.  It  is  possible  to  write  many  books  or  to  read 
them  without  growing  in  wisdom,  just  as  it  is  possible  to 
travel  in  foreign  countries  and  to  learn  no  more  than  if  ytJu 
had  remained  at  home. 

I  hope  that  what  has  been  said  will  be  enough  to  teach 
many  a  young  reader  that  one  of  the  most  substantial  en- 
joyments of  life  is  to  be  found  in  books.  With  such  com- 
panions no  one  need  be  idle  or  dull.  Let  them  be  used 
thoughtfully  and  lovingly,  and  you  will  find  that  they  grow 
dearer  every  day. 

John  Dennis,  in  Grt>od  Words. 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  AT  BUNKER  HILL. 

BY  ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP.* 

Fellow-citizens— I  cannot  assume  the  position  which  be- 
longs to  me  to-day,  as  president  of  the  Bunker  Hill  Monu- 
ment Association,  and  enter  on  the  discharge  of  the  duties 
which  devolve  upon  me  in  that  capacity,  without  first  giving 
expression  to  my  deep  sense  of  the  honor  of  an  office  which 
has  been  held  heretofore  by  so  many  distinguished  men. 

♦  An  oration  delivered  at  the  unveiling  of  W.  W.  Story's  statue  of  Col.  William 
Prescott,  at  Boston,  June  17,  1881. 


370  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Fifty-eight  years  have  now  elapsed  since  this  assoriatioii 
received  its  charter  of  incorporation  from  the  Legislature  of 
Massachusetts.  During  that  period  its  presidency  has  been 
held,  successively,  by  the  gallant  Revolutionary  patriot,  John 
Brooks ;  by  the  illustrious  defender  of  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  Daniel  Webster ;  by  the  grand  old  Boston  mer- 
chant and  philanthropist,  Thomas  Handasyd  Perkins  ;  by  that 
sterling  statesman  and  admirable  governor,  Levi  Lincoln ;  by 
that  eminent  and  learned  jurist  and  judge,  William  Prescott; 
by  the  amiable  physician.  Dr.  Abner  Phelps ;  by  the  accom- 
plished and  independent  editor,  Joseph  T*  Buckingham ;  by 
the  worthy  and  faithful  historian  of  the  association,  George 
Washington  Warren  ;  and  lastly,  by  the  devoted  and  excellent 
historian  of  the  battle  itself,  and  of  everything  relating  to  that 
battle — including  "  The  Siege  of  Boston,"  "  The  Life  of  War- 
ren," and  '*  The  Rise  of  the  Republic  "-—-our  lamented  friend, 
whose  name  I  cannot  pronounce  without  a  fresh  sense  of  his 
loss  to  us  and  to  the  history  of  his  country — Richard  Froth- 
ingham. 

If,  my  friends,  at  the  termination  of  the  brief  service  on 
which  I  can  look  back,  and  the  certainly  not  longer  service  to 
which  I  may  look  forward,  my  own  name  shall  not  be  thought 
unworthy  of  such  associations,  I  shall  count  it  to  have  been 
among  the  crowning  distinctions  of  a  life  now  drawing  to  its 
close. 

One,  only,  of  my  predecessors  is  left  among  the  living, 
whose  term  of  service,  as  I  may  not  forget,  equals  those  of 
all  others  put  together,  and  whose  presence  is  thus  welcomed 
with  peculiar  interest  on  this  occasion. 

One,  only,  of  those  predecessors  was  present,  as  a  witness 
and  as  an  actor,  at  the  conflict  which  our  monument  commem- 
orates,— ^John  Brooks  of  Medford — remembered  well  by  some 
ot  us  as  a  model  governor  of  Massachusetts,  bu{  in  1775  a 
young  major  in  Colonel  Frye's  regiment ;  who  aided  the 
heroic  Prescott  in  the  construction  of  the  redoubt ;  who  1^ 


WILUj\^  pre  SCO  TTATB  UNKER  HILL,         37  ^ 

his  chosen  companion  in  that  midnight  stroll  upon  the  shore, 
to  make  sure  that  the  British  sentinels  had  taken  no  alarm 
and  were  still  crying  "  All's  well  T  and  who  only  left  this  hill 
at  last  to  bear  a  message,  on  foot,  from  Prescott  to  General 
Ward  at  Cambridge, — across  that  Neck  of  fii;e,  on  which  the 
veteran  Pomeroy,  while  willingly  exposing  his  own  life,  would 
notrisk  the  life  of  a  borrowed  horse,  amid  the  ceaseless  storm 
of  shot  ^and  shell  which  was  sweeping  over  it  from  floating 
batteries  and  from  fixed  batteries,  from  the  Lively  and  the 
Falcon  and  the  Glasgow  and  the  Somerset  and  the  Cerberus ; 
a  message,  not  askmg  to  be  relieved  by  other  troops,  for  Pres- 
cott scorned  the  idea  that  the  men  who  had  raised  the  works 
had  not  the  best  right,  and  were  not  the  best  able,  to  defend 
them,  but  a  message  imploring  those  reinforcements  Md  sup- 
plies of  men,  of  ammunition,  and*of  food  which  had  been  pro- 
mised the  night  before,  but  most  of  which  never  came,  or  came 
too  late.    That  was  the  perilous  service  performed  by  our  first 
presiding  officer.    That  was  the  ordeal  to  which  he  was  sub- 
jected.    I  may  well  congratulate  myself  that  no  such  crucial 
test  of  courage  has  been  transmitted  as  an  heirloom  of  this 
chair,  or  is  prescribed  as  an   indispensable  qualification  of 
those  who  occupy  it. 

For  those  who  have  succeeded  Governor  Brooks,  it  has 
been  privilege  and  pride  enough  to  assist  in  the  erection  and 
preservation  of  thfs  noble  shaft ;  in  commemorating  from  year 
to  year  the  patriotism  and  heroism  of  the  men  who  fought 
this  first  great  battle  of  the  American  Revolution ;  and  in 
illustrating  the  principles  and  motives  which  inspired  and 
actuated  them.  This  duty  has  been  discharged  faithfully  and 
fully  in  the  past,  and  but  little  remains  to  be  done  by  any  one 
hereafter.  The  inspiration  and  influence  which  have  already 
proceeded  from  these  silent  blocks  of  granite,  since  they  were 
first  hewn  out  from  yonder  Quincy  quarries, — as  they  were 
slowly  piled  up  through  a  period  of  eighteen  years,  to  a  height 
of  two  hundred  and  twenty-one  feet,  and  as  they  have  since 


-372  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE^ 

stood  in  their  majestic  unity  and  grandeur, — can  never  be  over-  - 
estimated.  The  words  which  have  been  uttered  at  its  base  and 
around  it,  from  the  first  magnificent  address  of  Daniel  Webster, 
the  orator  alike  of  the  corner-stone  and  of  the  capstone,  down 
to  the  present  hour,  have  been  second  to  no  other  inspiration 
or  influence,  since  those  of  the  battle  itself,  in  animating  and 
impelling  the  sons  to  emulate  the  glory  of  their  fathers,  and  to 
be  ever  ready  and  ever  resolved  to  jeopard  their  live^,  on  the 
high  places  of  the  field,  in  defense  of  Union  and  Liberty. 

For  indeed,  my  friends,  this  stately  obelisk  is  no  mere  mute 
memorial  of  the  past,  but  a  living  ^nd  speaking  pledge  for 
the  future,  that  those  free  institutions  for  which  the  first  great 
struggle  was  made  here,  at  the  vpry  point  of  the  bayonet,  shall 
here  and  always  find  glad  and  g'allant  defenders,  whenever 
and  wherever  those  institutions  shall  be  assailed.  It  is  not  a 
structure — thanks  to  those  who  designed  and  built  it — capable 
of  being  desecrated  or  perverted — as,  alas  !  the  Old  South  has 
been,  and  the  Old  State  House  still  is — ^to  purposes  of  gain  or 
traffic.  It  occupies  ground  on  which  no  speculation  would 
ever  dare  to  encroach,  or  even  to  cast  a  rapacious  or  covetous 
eye.  Its  simple,  massive  masonry  may  defy  any  less  unimag- 
inable convulsion  than  such  as  has  recently  overwhelmed  the  • 
poor  island  of  Chios.  Not  a  monolith  ;  not  of  any  m)rthologi- 
cal  or  mythical  origin ;  there  will  be  no  temptation  for  archae- 
ologists to  dislocate  it  from  its  rightful  surroundings,  and  bear 
it  away  to  strange  and  uncongenial  climes.  Here,  on  the  very- 
spot  where  Prescott  fought  and  Warren  fell,  it  will  stand  and 
tell  its  wondrous  story  of  the  birth  of  American  Liberty,  in 
plain,  distinct,  unmistakable  characters,  to  the  thousands  and 
tens  of  thousands  and  hundreds  of  thousands  who  shall  visit 
it  or  gaze  upon  it,  for  as  manj*^  centuries  as  the  equivocal  hiero- 
glyphics of  the  obelisk  of  Alexandria,  now  so  marvelously 
.translated  to  the  Central  Park  at  New  York,  have  told  the 
story  of  Egyptian  despots  and  dynasties. 

How  different  a  story !    What  gratitude  to  God  and  man 


WILLIAM  PRE  SCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL.        373 

should  swell  our  hearts  at  this  hour,  as  such  a  contrast  is  even 
suggested — as  we  turn  from  the  contemplation  of  Pharaohs 
and  Ptolemies  to  that  of  dur  august  and  unique  Washington, 
and  from  the  darkness  of  paganism  to  the  glorious  light  of 
Christianity !  Formal  doxologies  may.disappear  from  revised 
New  Testaments, — hs  they  ought  to  disappear  if  not  found  in 
the  original  text  of  the  sacred  volume — but  they  will  never 
fail  to  be  breathed  up  to  the  skies  from  millions  of  pious  and 
patriotic  hearts,  from  generation  to  generation,  for  the  bless- 
ings of  civil  and  religious  freedom,  until  those  blessings  shall 
cease  to  be  enjoyed  and  appreciated ! 

-  And  now,  fellow-citizens,  in  hailing  the  return  of  a  day, 
which  can  hardly  be  counted  of  inferior  interest  or  importance 
to  any  day  in  the  whole  illuminated  calendar  of  the  American 
Revolution,  and  is  welcoming  you  all,  as  it  is  my  official 
province  to  do,  to  its  renewed  observance  on  these  con- 
secrated heights,  I  have  no  purpose  of  entering  upon  any 
detailed  historical  discourse.  The  seventeenth  of  June,  1775, 
as  its  successive  anniversaries  come  round,  from  year  to  year, 
will  never  be  overlooked,  nor  ever  fail  to  awaken  fresh 
emotions  of  gratiiude  and  joy  in  every  American  breast.  But 
.  the  more  formal  and  stately  commemorations  of  the  day  may 
well  succeed  each  other  at  considerable  intervals.  Our  mag- 
nificent centennial  celebration,  with  all  its  brilliant  incidents 
and  utterances,  is  still  too  fresh  in  our  remembrance,  and  in 
the  remembrance  of  the  whole  country,  to  bear  any  early 
repetition.  Nor  would  we  forget,  if  we  could  forget,  that 
other  centennial  celebrations  are  now  rightfully  in  order. 

The  year  '75  belonged  peculiarly  to  Massachusetts — ^to 
Lexington  and  Concord  and  Bunker  Hill.  The  whole  nation 
recognized  our  claim.  From  the  east  and  the  west,  from  the 
north  and  the.  south,  alike,  to  yonder  plains  of  the  first  blood, 
and  to  this  hill  of  the  first  battle,  the  people  were  seen  flock- 
ing in  numbers  which  could  not  be  counted.  Citizens  and 
soldiers  of  almost  every  variety  of  military  or  civil  associa- 


374  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

tion ;  representative  organizations  and  representative  men ; 
mayors  of  cities,  governors  of  states,  senators  and  cabinet 
officers,  the  President  of  the  United^  States  to  one  of  them, 
and  the  Vice-President  to  both,  came  gladly,  at  the  call  of 
Massachusetts,  to  unite  with  her  in  her  sumptuous  and  splendid 
ceremonials.  Six  years  only  have  since  elapsed,  during  which* 
we  have  rejoiced  to  see  other  states,  and  other  cities  and  towns, 
in  New  York  and  New  Jersey,  in  Vermont  and  Pennsylvania, 
in  North  Carolina  and  South  Carolina,  and  I  know  not  where 
besides,  holding  high  holidays  on  the  hundredth  anniversaries 
of  events  which  have  illustrated  their  own  annals. 

Another  great  year  of  our  Lord  and  of  liberty  has  at 
length  arrived,  and  is  already  far  advanced,  and  the  attention 
of  the  whole  country  is  now  justly  turned  to  that  momentous 
Southern  campaign  of  1781,  which  began  with  the  great  battle 
of  the  Cowpens, — ^just  celebrated  so  worthily, — and  which 
ended  with  the  surrender  of  the  British  army  to  the  allied  forces 
of  America  arid  France  at  Yorktown.  I  need  not  say  that  all 
our  hearts  ought  to  be,  and  are,  with  our  brethren  of  the 
South,  as  they  are  so  eagerly  preparing  to  celebrate  the  great 
events  which  occurred  on  their  own  soil.  We  should  shrink 
from  anything  which  might  even  seem  like  competition  by 
renewing  a  general  and  costly  celebration  here.  Rather  let 
our  sympathies  be  freely  offered,  and  our  <:ontributions  be 
liberally  remitted  to  them ;  and  let  us  show  how  heartily  we 
unite  with  them  in  their  just  pride  and  exultation  that  the  soil 
of  the  Old  Dominion  was  privileged  to  be  the  scene  of  the 
crowning  victory  of  American  independence.  And  may  the 
blended  associations  and  memories  of  Yorktown  and  Bunker 
Hill  supply  the  reciprocal  warp  and  woof  for  weaving  afresh 
any  ties  of  mutual  respect  and  mutual  affection  which  may 
have  been  unstrung  or  loosened  by  the  storm  of  civil  war,  and 
which  may  still  remain  snarled  and  tangled,  and  for  renewing 
the  chords  of  brotherhood  and  those  bonds  of  union  which 
shall  be  as  imperishable  as  the  glories  of  our  common  fathers ! 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL,         375 

I  have  said,  fellow-citizens,  that  I  did  not  come  here  to-day 
to  deliver  any  elaborate  or  exhaustive  historical  discourse. 
Indeed,  where  could  I  turn,  even  if  it  were  expected  or  desired 
by  any  one  that  I  should  describe  in  detail  the  struggle  which 
has  made  this  hill  so  historic  and  so  hallowed — where  could  I 
turn  for  any  materials  which  have  not  already  become  hack- 
neyed and  threadbare,  and  which  are  not  as  familiar  as  house- 
hold words  to  those  who  surround  me  ?  No  battle  of  its  size, 
or  of  any  size,  the  world  over,  from  Marathon  to  Waterloo,  or 
earlier  or  later,  on  either  side  of  the  ocean,  has  been  more 
thoroughly  investigated  and  more  minutely  depicted  than  that 
which  took  place  here  one  hundred  and  six  years  ago  to-day. 
Of  all  its  antecedents  and  inducing  causes— the  stamp  act,  the 
writs  of  assistance,  the  British  regiments,  the  Boston  massa- 
cre, the  tea  tax,  the  tea  party,  the  Boston  port  bill,  Lexington, 
Concord — of  which  one  of  them  all  has  a  single  fact,  a  single 
tradition,  a  single  illustratipn,  eluded  the  research  of  our  his- 
torians and  antiquarians,  our  orators  and  poets  ?  And  as  to 
the  conflict  itself — to  which  they  all  pointed  and  led,  like  so 
many  guideposts  or  railway  tracks  to  a  common  and  predes- 
tined terminus — what  could  be  added  to  the  brilliant  chapters 
of  Bancroft,  the  thrilling  sketch  of  Washington  Irving,  the 
careful  illustrations  of  Lossing,  the  elaborate  and  faithful 
narrative  of  Frothingham,  and  the  earlier  and  most  valuable 
histor)'-  of  Dr.  George  E.  Ellis,  who  made  even  Frothingham  his 
debtor?  Meantime,  as  I  am  but  too  conscious,  the  rhetoric, 
as  well  as  the  record,  has  been  drawn  upon  to  the  last  dreg. 
Not  only  have  Webster  and  Everett,  again  and  again,  con- 
densed and  crystallized  all  the  great  scenes  and  incidents  and 
emotions  of  the  day  in  those  consummate  phrases  and  periods 
of  theirs,  which  defy  all  rivalry,  and  supply  the  most  inspiring 
and  wholesome  declamation  for  all  our  schools ;  but  the  whole 
story  was  told  again,  with  signal  felicity  and  skill,  in  all  the 
fullness  of  its  impressive  details,  by  the  orator  of  the  Centen- 
nial, General  Devens,  whose  presence  is  always  so  welcome 
in  his  native  Charlestown. 


37^  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

No  one,  I  think,  with  such  histories  and  field-books  and 
hand-books  at  command,  and  who  has  not  wholly  neglected 
such  sources  of  information,  can  come  up  to  these  consecrated 
heights,  to  this  Mons  Sacer  of  New  England,  on  this  day,  or 
on  any  day,  without  finding  the  whole  scene  unrolling  itself 
before  his  eye  like  some  grand  stereoscopic  panorama.  He 
recalls  the -sudden  gathering  of  the  three  selected  Massachu- 
setts regiments — with  the  little  Connecticut  fatigue  party 
under  the  intrepid  Knowlton,  in  front  of  General  Ward's  head- 
quarters at  Cambridge  on  the  evening  of  the  i6th  of  June. 
He  sees  Prescott  taking  command,  agreeably  to  the  order  of 
the  commander-in-chief.  He  hears,  as  through  a  telephone^ 
the  solemn  and  fervent  prayer  of  President  Langdon,  before 
they  moved  from  the  Common.  He  takes  up  the  silent  march 
with  them,  just  as  the  clock  strikes  nine,  and  follows  close  by 
the  side  of  those  two  sergeants,  bearing  dark  lanterns,  behind 
Prescott  leading  the  way.  He  halts  with  them  after  crossing 
to  this  peninsula,  as  they  approach  the  scene  of  their  destina- 
tion, and  shares  their  perplexing  uncertainties  as  to  the  true 
place  for  their  proposed  intrenchments.  He  is  here  with  them 
at  last,  on  this  very  spot,  with  nothing  brighter  than  starlight, 
thank  Heaven,  when  they  first  arrived,  to  betray  them  to  the 
British  in  Boston,  and  with  only  a  little  "  remnant  of  a  waning 
moon  "  afterwards.  He  hears  and  sees  the  first  spades  and 
pickaxes  struck  into  the  now  sacred  sod  just  as  the  Boston 
clocks  strike  twelve — ^giving  their  ominous  warning  that  the 
night  is  far  spent,  that  the  day  is  at  hand,  that  four  hours  at 
most  remain  before  the  darkness  shall  be  gone,  when  they  and 
their  works  must  be  exposed  to  the  view  and  the  assault  of 
the  enemy.  But  he  sees  a  thousand  strong  arms,  every  one 
with  a  patriot's  will  behind  it,  steadily  and  vigorously  improv- 
ing every  instant  of  those  hours ;  and  the  dawning  of  that 
bright  midsummer  St.  Botolph's  day  finds  him  stan4ing  with 
Prescott  within  an  almost  finished  redoubt  of  six  or  seven  feet 
'n  height,  inclosing  a  space  of  eight  rods  square,  and  swarm- 

r  with  the  sons  of  Liberty. 


WILLIAM  PJ^ESCO TT  AT  B UNKER  HILL,         377 

But,  alas,  the  panorama  is  but  half  unrolled.  Crimson  folds, 
not  altogether  the  reflections  of  a  blazing,  fiery  sunshine, 
begin  to  show  themselves,  as  the  vision  of  our  imaginary- 
visitor  proceeds.  ,He  witnesses  the  amazement  and  consterna- 
tion of  the  British  sentinels  on  ship  and  shore,  as  they  rouse 
themselves  and  rub  their  eyes  to  descry  the  rebel  intrench- 
ments  which  have  sprung  up  like  a  prodigy.  He  hears  the 
angry  and  furious  cannonade  which  bursts  forth  at  once  from 
the  dogs  of  war  anchored  in  the  stream.  He  walks  the  para- 
pet with  Prescott,  lo  give  confidence  and  courage  to  his  sol- 
diers, as  they  see  one  of  their  number,  for  the  first  time,  shot 
•  down  and  dying  at  their  side.  He  perceives  the  hurried 
preparations  in  Boston  ;  he  sees  the  dragoons  galloping  with 
orders  from  the  Province  House  to  the  camp  on  the  Common  ; 
he  hears  the  rattle  of  the  artillery  wagons  along  the  pave- 
ments. The  big  barges  for  transportation  come  at  length  in 
sight,  with  the  glittering  brass  six-pounders  in  their  bows,  and 
crowded  from  stem  to  stern  with  grenadiers  and  light  infantry 
and  marines  in  their  gay  scarlet  uniforms.  He  sees  them 
landing  at  yonder  Morton's  Point,  and  coolly  refreshing  them- 
selves on  the  grass  for  an  encounter  with  our  half-starved  and 
almost  wholly  exhausted  raw  militia.  The  first  onset,  with 
its  grand  and  triumphant  repulse ;  the  second  onset,  while 
Charlestown  is  now  blazing,  and  amid  every  circumstance  and 
complication  of  horror,  but  with  its  even  grander  and  still 
more  triumphant  repulse, — these  pass  rapidly  before  his  exults 
ing  eye.  An  interval  now  occurs.  "  Will  they  come  on 
again  ?  "  is  heard  on  the  American  side.  "  It  would  be  down- 
right butchery  for  us,"  is  heard  from  some  of  the  British 
soldfers  on  the  other  side.  And,  certainjy,  the  pluck  of  old 
Mother  England  was  never  more  signally  displayed  on  our 
soil,  or  on  any  other  soil  beneath  the  sun,  than  when  General 
Sir  William  Howe,  as  brave  in  the  field  as  he  was  sometimes 
irresolute  and  unskillful  in  strategy,  with  Brigadier  Pigot  as 
his  lieutenant,  and  with  Sir  Henry  Clinton  as  a  volunteer,  led 


378  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

up  what  remained  of  grenadiers  and  light  infantry — their 
knapsacks  stripped  from  their  backs,  and  relying  wholly  on 
their  bayonets — to  that  third  terrific  onset,  which  comes  at 
last  to  sear  the  very  eyeballs  of  any  actual,  or  even  imaginary 
beholder.  But  there  was  pluck  at  the  top  of  the  hill  as  well 
as  at  the  bottom,  or  on  the  way  up, — bone  of  the  same  bone, 
flesh  of  the  same  flesh,  blood  of  the  same  blood, — ^the  valor  of 
Old  England,  inflamed  and  electrified  by  the  spirit  of  liberty, 
in  the  heart,  mind,  and  muscle  of  New  England. 

Prescott  with  his  little  band  is  seen  standing  undatinted  at 
bay,  displaying  there  and  ever — as  Ebenezer  Bancroft  of 
Tyngsborough,  a  captain  in  Bridge's  regiment,  who  fought 
bravely  and  was  wounded  at  his  side,  bore  special  witness 
that  he  had  displayed  through  the  hottest  of  the  fight — a  cool- 
ness and  self-posession  that  would  do  honor  to  the  greatest 
hero  of  any  age.  But,  alas  !  their  ammunition  is  exhausted, 
and  tlie  British  have  overheard  that  it  is.  The  very  last  artil- 
lery cartridge  has  been  broken  up  and  distributed  to  the 
sharpshooters,  and  there  are  but  fifty  bayonets  for  the  whole 
remaining  band — hardly  a  hundred  and  fifty  of  them  left. 
The  grenadiers  and  marines  are  already  seen  scaling  the  ram- 
parts. The  brave  but  rash  Major  Pitcairn,  who  had  given  the 
first  fatal  order  to  fire  at  Lexington,  and  who  was  now  the 
first  to  enter  here,  falls  mortally  wounded.  But  hundreds  of 
his  men  are  close  behind  him,  and  bayonets  and  clubbed  mus- 
kets are  now  making  a  chaotic  scene  of  carnage  and  havoc 
which  beggars  all  description.  The  redoubt  can  no  longer  be 
held  against  such  desperate  odds,  and  the  voice  of  its  wise 
as  well  as  fearless,  commander  is  at  length  heard,  giving  the 
word  to  retire. 

The  battle  still  rages  at  earthworks  and  at  rail  fences — 
almost  a  separate  engagement — where  Stark  and  Pomeroy  and 
Knowlton  have  been  doing  such  gallant  service  from  the 
beginning;  and  where  Putnam,  who  had  advised  and  accom- 
panied the  original  movement,  and  had  displayed  every  attri- 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL,        379 

bute  of  his  heroic  nature  in  promoting  its  successful  prosecu- 
tion, in  almost  every  stage  of  its  progress,  is  seen  still  striving 
to  make  a  last  stand  on  the  neighboring  hill-top,  and  to  cover 
the  retreat  of  his  brave  comrades  from  the  redoubt.  But  all 
th^  is  auxiliary  and  incidental,  as  it.all.is  vain.  It  is  one  and 
the  same  battle,  in  its  inception  and  in  its  close.  The  day  is 
decided ;  the  conflict  ended ;  and  Prescott,  among  the  very 
last  to  quit  the  intrenchments,  having  resolved  never  to  be 
taken  alive,  and  parrying  the  thrusts  of  British  bayonets  by 
dint  of.  his  trusty  blade,  comes  out  with  garments  scorched 
and  pierced,  but  himself  providentially  unscathed ;  and  he 
•may  now  be  seen,  on  the  final  fold  of  our  imaginary  pano- 
rama, at  the  headquarters  of  Greneral  Ward  at  Cambridge — from 
which  he  started  the  evening  before — ^to  report  that  he  had 
executed  his  orders,  had  made  the  best  fight  in  his  power, 
and  had  yielded  at  last  onjy  to  superior  force. 

Such,  fellow-citizens  and  friends,  are  the  faint  outlines  of  a 
picture  which  passes  rapidly  along  before  any  tolerably  in- 
structed eye,  as  it  looks  out  on  these  surroundings — impress- 
ing itself  on  retina  and  lens  as  vividly  and  distinctly  as  Bos- 
ton's Centennial  pageant  last  autumn,  or  Harvard's  Greek  play 
last  month,  was  impressed  on  every  eye  which  witnessed  either 
of  them.  Such  a  picture  is  enough  for  this  occasion.  These 
Charlestowh  heights,  of  which  it  might  almost  have  been  said, 
as  Virgil  said  of  the  afterwards  famous  Alban  Mount — 

Turn  neqne  nomen  erat,  nee  honos,  aut  gloria  Monti, 

which  then  had  neither  glory  nor  honor,  nor  even  distinct 
and  well-defined  names — Bunker  Hill  and  its  dependent  slope, 
Breed — were  lost  to  us  on  that  day.  The  consequences  of  the 
battle,  and  even  the  confused  details  of  it,  developed  them- 
selves slowly.  It  took  time  for  an  immediate  defeat  to  put 
on  the  aspect  and  wear  the  glories  of  a  triumph.  I  doubt 
not  that  some  of  the  old  Mandamus  Councilors  in  Boston 
went  to  their  beds  that  night  thinking  what  a  fine  conspicuous 
site  this  would  be  for  setting  up  a  monument  of  solemn 


38o  "  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE. 

warning,  for  all  time  to  come,  of  the  disasters  which  were 
sure  to  fall  on  the  heads  of  rebels  against  British  rule !  Even 
by  our  own  New  England  patriots  the  result,  we  are  told,  was 
regarded  at  first  not  without  disappointment  and  even  indig- 
nation, and  some  of  the  contemporary  American  accounts, 
private  and  official,  are  said  to  have  been  rather  in  the  tone  of 
apology,  or  even  of,  censure,  than  of  exultation.  Nobody  for 
years,  adds  Frothingham,  came  forward  to  claim  the  honor  of 
having  directed  this  battle. 

No  wonder  that  a  cloud  of  uncertainty  so  long  rested  on 
the  exact  course  and  conduct  of  this  eventful  action.  Every 
one  was  wholly  occupied  in  making  history ;  there  was  no* 
leisure  for  writing  history.  It  was  a  sudden  movement.  It 
was  a  secret  movement.  It  was  designed  only  to  get  the  start 
of  the  British  by  an  advance  of  our  line  of  intrenchments. 
No .  one  imagined  that  it  would  involve  a  battle,  and  no 
adequate  provision  was  made  for  such  an  unexpected  contin- 
gency. The  very  order  for  its  execution — the  order  of  Ward 
to  Prescott — the  only  order  from  any  one,  or  to  any  one, 
relating  to  it,  was,  without  doubt,  designedly  withheld  from 
the  order-book  of  the  commander^n-chief  at  Cambridge,  It 
certainly  has  never  been  found.  ^ 

Meantime,  one  incident  of  the  conflict  had  overwhelmed 
the  whole  people  with  grief.  The  death  of  Warren,  the 
president  of  the  Provincial  Congress,  the  chairman  of  the 
Committee  of  Safety,  the  only  chief  executive  magistr^tte 
which  Massachusetts  then  had,  and  who,  only  three  days 
before,  had  been  chosen  one  of  the  major-generals  of  her 
forces — in  the  bloom  of  his  manhood,  "  the  expectancy  and 
rose  of  the  fair  State,"  beloved  and  trusted  by  all — could  not, 
and  did  not,  fail  to  create  a  sorrow  and  a  shock  which  absorbed 
all  hearts.  The  death  of  the  glorious  John  Hampden  on 
.  Chalgrove  Field  is  the  only  parallel  in  history  to  that  of  Joseph 
Warren  at  Bunker  Hill.  That  thrilling  lament—almost  recall- 
ing the  wail  of  David  over  Absalom—to  which  Webster  gave 


WILLIAM  PRE  SCO  TT  AT  B  UNKER  HILL.  ,       38 1 

utterance  here  in  1825,  making  the  whole  air  around  him 
vibrate  to  the  pathos  of  his  tones,  and  leaving  hardly  an 
unmoistened  eye  in  his  whole  vast  audience,  was  but  a  faint 
echo  of  the  deep  distress  into  which  that  event  had  plunged 
all  New  England  fifty  years  before.  But  though  one  of  War- 
ren's proudest  distinctions  will  ever  be  that  he  came  to  this 
hill  as  a  volunteer,  before  he  had  received  any  military  com- 
mission, and  that  he  nobly  declined  to  assume  any  authority 
— ^when  Putnam  proposed  to  take  his  orders  at  the  rail  fence, 
and  again  when  Prescott  offered  him  the  command  at  the 
redoubt — his  name  was  long  associated,  both  at  home  and 
abroad,  with  the  chief  leadership  of  an  action  to  which  he  had 
come  with  a  musket  on  his  shoulder — though  he  may  have 
exchanged  it  for  a  sword  before  he  fell. 

Everything,  indeed,  was  in  doubt  and  confusion  at  that 
moment.  Even  Warren's  death  was  not  known  for  a  certainty 
at  Cambridge  for  several  days  after  it  occurred,  and  as  late  as 
the  19th  the  vote  of  the  Provincial  Congress,  providing  for 
the  choice  of  his  successor,  spoke  of  him  as  one  "  supposed 
to  be  killed."  All  our  military  affairs  were  in  a  state  of  trans- 
ition, reorganization  and  complete  change.  The  war  was  to 
be  no  longer  a  local  or  provincial  war.  The  Continental  Con- 
gress at  Philadelphia  had  already  adopted  it  as  a  war  of  the 
United  Colonies ;  and,  on  the  very  day  on  which  Warren  fell 
they  had  drawn  up  and  ratified  a  commission,  as  general  and 
commander-in-chief  of  all  such  forces  as  are,  or  shall  be, 
raised  for  the  maintenance  and  preservation  of  American 
liberty,  for  George  Washington  of  Virginia.  Congress  had 
heard  nothing  about  Bunker  Hill,  when  this  providential  ap- 
pointment was  made.  Lexington  and  Concord,  of  which  the 
tidihgs  had  reached  them  some  weeks  before,  had  been  enough 
to  ripen  their  counsels  and  settle  their  policy.  And  now  the 
public  mind  in  this  quarter  was  too  much  engrossed  with 
the  advent  of  Washington  to  Cambridge,  and  the  great  results 
which  were  to  be  expected,  to  busy  itself  much  with  the  d^ 
tails  of  what  was  considered  a  mere  foregone  defeat. 


'382  THE  LIBRARY 'MAGAZINE, 

It  was  only  when  Washington  himself,  hearing  at  New  York 
or  Trenton,  on  his  way  to  Cambridge,  of  what  had  occurred 
here,  had  expressed  his  renewed  and  confirmed  conviction 
that  the  liberties  of  America  were  now  safe  ;  it  was  only  when 
Franklin,  hearing  of  it  in  France,  wrote  to  his  friends  in  Lon- 
don :  "  Americans  will  fight ;  England  has  lost  her  colonies 
forever ;"  it  was  only  when  Gage  had  written  to  Lord  Dart- 
mouth that  "  the  rebels  are  not  the  despicable  rabble  too  many 
have  supposed  them  to  be.  .  .  .  The  number  of  killed  and 
wounded  is  greater  than  our  forces  can  afford  to  lose.  .  .  .  The 
conquest  of  this  country  is  not  easy.  .  .  !  I  think  it  ray  duty 
to  let  your  lordship  know  the  true  situation  of  affair^ ;"  it  was 
certainly,  only  when  from  all  the  American  colonies  there 
had  come  voices  of  congratulation  and  good  cheer,  recogniz- 
ing the  momentous  character  of  the  battle,  the  bravery  with 
which  it  had  been  fought,  and  the  conclusive  evidence  it  had 
afforded  that  the  undisciplined  yeomanry  of  the  country  were 
not  afraid  to  confront  the  veteran  armies  of  Old  England  at 
the  point  of  the  bayonet  in  defense  of  their  rights  and  liber- 
ties ;  it  was  only  then  that  its  true  importance  began  to  be 
attached  to  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill,  as  the  first  regular  bat- 
tle of  the  American  Revolution,  and  the  most  eventful  in  its 
consequences — especially  in  those  far-reaching  moral  influ- 
ences which  were  to  be  felt,  and  which  were  felt,  to  the  very 
end  of  the  war. 

A  much  longer  time  was  to  elapse  before  the  record  of  that 
day  was  to  be  summed  up,  as  it  has  recently  been,  by  the  lat- 
est and  highest  authority  on  "  The  Battles  of  the  Revolution," 
as  "  the  record  of  a  battle  which  in  less  than  two  hours  de- 
stroyed a  town,  laid  fifteen  hundred  men  upon  the  battle  field, 
equalized  the  relations  of  veterans  and  militia,  aroused  three 
millions  of  people  to  a  definite  struggle  for  national  indepebd- 
ence,  and  fairly  inaugurated  the  war  for  its  accomplishment." 

Let  me  not  omit,  however,  to  add,  that  no  more  emphatic, 
or  more  generous,  or  more  just  and  welcome  tribute,  has  ever 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL.         383 

been  paid  to  the  men  and  the  deeds  we  are  commemorating 
to-day,  than  that  which  may  be  found  in  the  "  Memoirs  of  the 
Southern  Campaign  of  the  Revolution,"  where  an  incidental 
allusion  to  Bunker  Hill  concludes  with  these  emphatic  words  : 
"  The  military  annals  of  the  world  rarely  furnish  an  achieve- 
ment which  equals  the  firmness  and  courage  displayed  on  that 
proiid  day  by  the  gallant  band  of  Americans  ;  and  it  certainly 
stands  first  in  the  brilliant  events  of  our  war.  When  future 
g-enerations  shall  inquire  where  are  the  men  who  gained  the 
highest  prize  of  glory  in  the  arduous  contest  which  ushered 
in  our  nation's  birth,  upon  Prescott  and  his  companions  in 
arms  will  the  eye  of  history  beam." 

These  are  the  words  written  and  published  seventy  years 
ago  by  Henry  Lee  of  Virginia,  the  gallant  commander  of  the 
famous  Cavalry  Legion,  known  familiarly  as  "  Light  Horse 
Harry,"  and  the  father  of  one  whose  purity  of  character  and 
brilliancy  of  accomplishments  compelled  each  one  of  us  who 
knew  him  to  exclaim,  as  the  late  war  for  the  Union  went  on, 
'*  Cum  talis  sis,  utinam  noster  esses  !  "  Would  we  could  call  so 
grand  a  leader  ours ! 

Frothingham  has  told  us  truly  that  no  one,  for  years,  came 
forward  to  claim  the  honor  of  having  directed  this  battle. 
And  there  was  at  least  one  man— of  whom  Everett  well  said, 
"  The  modesty  of  this  sterling  patriot  was  equal  to  his  hero- 
ism " — who  never  to  the  end  of  his  life  made  any  boastful 
claim  for  himself,  who  was  contented  with  stating  the  facts  of 
that  eventful  day  in  reply  to  the  inquiries  of  John  Adams,  and 
in  repeated  conversations  with  his  own  son,  and  who  then 
awaited  the  judgment  of  history,  letting  all  considerations  of 
personal  fame  and  personal  glory  go,  in  the  proud  conscious- 
ness of  having  done  his  duty. 

And  now,  fellow-citizens,  we  are  gathered  here  to-day  to 
pay  a  long-postponed  debt,  to  fulfill  a  long-neglected  obliga- 
tion. We  have  come  to  sanction  and  ratify  the  award  of 
history,  as  we  find  it  in  the  pages  of  Ellis  and  Irving  and  Froth- 


3  84     *  V.  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINM. 

ingham  and  Bancroft,  to  mention  no  others,  by  accepting  this 
splendid  gift  from  a  large  company  of  our  fellow  citizens,  of 
whose  names  Dr.  Ellis,  I  believe, — to  whose  inspiration  we 
primarily  owe  it, — is  the  sole  depository  ;  and  by  placing  the 
statue  of  Colonel  William  Prescott  in  the  very  front  of  our 
noble  monument — thus  recognizing  him  in  his  true  relation 
to  the  grand  action  which  it  commemorates,  and  of  which  he 
was  nothing  less  than  the  commander.  We  do  so  in  full 
remembrance  of  those  memorable  words  of  Webster,  which 
have  almost  the  solemnity  and  the  weight  of  a  judicial  decis- 
ion :  "  In  truth,  if  there  was  any  commander-in-chief  in  the 
field,  it  was  Prescott.  From  the  first  breaking  of  the  ground 
to  the  retreat,  he  acted  the  most  important  part ;  and  if  it 
were  proper  to  give  the  battle  a  name,  from  any  distinguished 
agent  in  it,  it  should  be  called  Prescott's  Battle." 

Our  celebration  to-day  has  this  sole  and  simple  end ;  and 
it  becomes  me,  therefore,  my  friends,  to  devote  the  little 
remnant  of  my  address  to  a  brief  notice  of  the  career  and 
character  of  the  man  we  are  assembled  to  honor. 

Descended  from  a  good  Puritan  stock  which  had  emigrated 
from  Lancashire  in  old  England,  and  established  a  home  in 
New  England,  as  early  as  1640,  he  was  born  in  Groton,  in  this 
good  old  county  of  Middlesex,  on  the  20th  of  February,  1726. 
Of  his  boyhood  and  common-school  education  there  are  no 
details.  But  soon  after  arriving  at  maturity  we  find  him 
purchasing  of  the  Indians,  then  still  numerous  in  that  region, 
a  tract  of  land,  a  few  miles  beyond  the  present  limit  of  Groton, 
which  his  great-grandson  stiH  holdf  by  the  original  Indian 
title.  Here  he  was  more  or  less  instrumental,  with  the 
patriot  clergyman  of  the  parish,  Joseph  Emerson,  who  had. 
served  as  a  chaplain  under  Sir  William  Pepperell,  in  havin'g 
that  part  of  Groton  set  off  into  a  separate  district,  and  named 
Pepperell,  in  honor  of  the  conqueror  of  Louisbu'rg. 

Meantime,  the  soldierly  spirit  which  belonged  to  his  nature 
and  which  had  been  called  into  exercise  by  the  proximity  of 


L 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL,         3^5 

the  savages,  had  led  him  as  early  as  October,  1746 — when  the 
approach  of  a  formidable  French  fleet  had  created  a  con- 
sternation in  New  England — ^to  enlist  in  the  company  of 
Captain  William  Lawrence,  and  march  for  the  defense  of 
Boston.  A  few  years  later  he  takes  the  office  of  a  lieutenant 
in  the  local  militia,  and,  in  1755,  proceeds  with  his  regiment 
to  Nova  Scotia.  Serving  there  under  General  Winslow,  his 
gallantry  attracted  special  attention,  and  he  was  urged  by  the 
general  to  accept  a  commission  in  the  regular  army.  De- 
clining this  offer,  he  returned  home  to  receive  the  promotion 
to  a  captaincy.  A  happy  marriage  soon  followed,  and  he  re- 
mained for  nearly  twenty  years  as  a  farmer  and  good  citizen 
at  his  Pepperell  home ;  as  Addison  said  of  some  of  the  heroes 
of  his  "  Campaign  " — 

In  hours  of  peace  content  to  be  unknown, 
And  only  in  the  field  of  battle  shown. 

But  the  controversies  with  the  mother  country  were  by  no 
means  unobserved  by  him.  The  bill  for  shutting  up  the  port 
of  Boston,  with  the  view  of  starving  the  people  into  submission 
and  compliance,  signed  by  the  king  on  the  31st  of  March,  and 
which  went  into  operation  on  the  ist  of  June,  1774,  stirred 
the  feelings  and  called  forth  the  succors  of  the  whole  con- 
tinent. Letters  of  sympathy  and  supplies  of  provisions  poured 
in  upon  our  Boston  Committee  of  Correspondence,  in  answer 
to  their  appeal,  from  every  quarter.  The  earliest  letter  but 
two,  in  order  of  date,  was  signed  William  Prescott,  dated 
Pepperell,  4th  of  July,  by  order  of  the  committee  of  that 
always  patriotic  town — sending  at  once  forty  bushels  of  grain, 
promising  further  assistance  with  provisions  and  with  men, 
and  invoking  them  "  to  stand  firm  in  the  common  cause." 
The  cause  of  Boston  was  then  the  cause  of  all. 

But  the  untiring  research  of  the  historian,  Bancroft,  brought 
to  light,  for  the  first  time,  some  years  ago,  a  still  more  import- 
ant and  memorable  letter  from  Prescott  in  behalf  of  his  fellow 
farmers  and  townspeople,  addressed,  in  the  following  Augus^ 
L.  M.— 13      ^ 


386      .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

to  the  men  of  Boston,  which  breathes  the  fiill  spirit  of  Lexing- 
ton and  Concord  and  Bunker  Hill  conjoined,  not  without  a 
strong  foretaste  of  the  still  distant  Fourth  of  July.  "  Be  not 
dismayed  or  disheartened,"  it  says, ''  in  this  great  day  of  trials. 
We  heartily  sympathize  with  you,  and  are  always  ready  to  do  all 
in  our  power  for  your  support,  comfort,  and  relief;  knowing 
that  Providence  has  placed  you  where  you  must  stand  the  first 
shock.  We  consider  that  we  are  all  embarked  in  one  bottom, 
and  must  sink  x)r  swim  together.  We  think  if  we  submit  to 
thbse  regulations,  all  is  gone.  Our  forefathers  passed  the  vast 
Atlantic,  spent  their  blood  and  treasure,  that  they  might  enjoy 
their  liberties,  both  civil  and  religious,  and  transmit  them  to 
their  posterity.  Their  children  have  waded  through  seas  of 
difficulty,  to  leave  us  free  and  happy  in  the  enjoyment  of 
English  privileges.  Now,  if  we  should  give  them  up,  can  our 
children  rise  up  and  call  us  blessed  ?  Is  not  a  glorious  death 
in  defense  of  our  liberties  better  than  a  short,  infamous  life, 
and  our  memories  to  be  had  in  detestation  to  the  latest  pos- 
terity? Let  us  all  be  of  one  heart,  and  stand  fast  in  the 
liberties  wherewith  Christ  has  made  us  free  ;  and  may  he  of 
his  infinite  mercy  grant  us  deliverance  out  of  all  our  troubles." 

No  braver,  nobler  words  than  these  of  Prescott  are  found 
in  all  the  records  of  that  momentous  period. 

And  now,  the  time  having  fully  come  for  testing  these 
pledges  of  readiness  for  the  last  resort  of  an  oppressed  people, 
and  the  voices  of  Joseph  Hawley  and  Patrick  Henry  having 
been  distinctly  heard,  responding  to  each  other  from  Massa- 
chusetts to  Virginia,  "  We  must  fight,"  Prescott  is  seen  in 
command  of  a  regiment  of  minutemen.  At  the  first  alarm 
that  blood  had  been  shed  at  Lexington,  and  that  fighting  was 
still  going  on  at  Concord,  on  the  19th  of  April  he  rallies  that 
regiment  without  an  instant's  delay,  and  leads  them  at  once 
to  the  scene.  Arriving  too  late  to  join  in  the  pursuit  of  the 
flying  regulars,  he  proceeds  to  Cambridge,  and  there  awaits 
events,  till,  on  the  following  i6th  of  June,  he  receives  ^the 


r 


WILLIAM  PRESCOTT  AT  BUNKER  HILL.        1^7 

order  from  General  Ward—the  commandet-in-chief  of  the 
Massachusetts  forces,  with  whom  he  had  been  in  constant 
communication  and  consultation — to  conduct  the  secret  expe- 
dition which  resulted  in  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill. 

All  that  remains  of  his  career,  after  that  battle  was  over, 
may  be  summarily  dispatched.  He  had  originally  enlisted 
for  eight  months,  hoping  and  believing  that  troops  would  not 
be  needed  for  a  longer  period ;  but  he  continued  in  the  service 
until  the  close  of  1776,  when  Boston  had  been  freed  from  the 
enemy,  when  independence  had  been  declared,  and  when  the 
-war  had  been  transferred  to  other  parts  of  the  country.  Nor 
did  he  leave  it  then  until  he  had  commanded  the  garrison  on 
Governor's  Island  in  the  harbor  of  New  York,  and  had 
attracted  the  notice  and  commendation  of  Washington  by  the 
good  order  in  which  he  brought  off  his  regiment  when  the 
American  army  was  compelled  to  retire  from  the  city.  He 
was  then  more  than  fifty  years  old,  and  physical  infirmities 
incapacitated  him  for  the  saddle.  But  in  the  autumn  of  1777 
he  once  more  appears,  as  a  volunteer,  at  the  battle  which 
ended  in  the  surrender  of  Burgoyne;  and  Trumbull,  the  artist, 
who  unconsciously,  and  to  his  own  often  expressed  regret,  did 
hira  such  injustice  in  his  fancy  sketch  of  the  battle  on  this 
hill,  has  made  ample  amends  in  his  picture  of  "  Burgoyne's 
Surrender  *' — now  in  the  rotunda  of  the  Capitol  at  Washington 
— by  giving  him  a  place,  musket  in  hand,  in  the  principal 
group,  next  to  the  gallant  Morgan  of  the  Virginia  Riflemen, 
whose  statue,  by  a  striking  coincidence,  has  just  been  unveiled 
at  the  Cowpens,  at  the  Centennial  celebration  of  that  great 
South  Carolina  battle,  of  which  Morgan  was  the  hero,  as  Pres- 
cott  was  the  hero  of  this.  No  two  men  are  more  worthy  to 
stand  side  by  side  in  our  national  historic  gallery  than  William 
Prescott  and  Daniel  Morgan.  Honor  to  the  memories  of 
them  both  in  all  time  to  come,  from  every  tongue  and  every 
laeart  throughout  our  land  ! 

Again  Prescott  withdraws  to  his  farm  at  Pepperell,  where 


388  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

he  constantly  exhibits  a  vigilant  interest,  and  exercises  a  . 
wholesome  influence,  in  the  affairs  of  the  town  and  of  the 
State,  serving  his  fellow  citizens  as  a  magistrate  and  a  select- 
man, coming  down  to  Boston  in  three  several  years  as  their 
representative  in  the  State  Legislature,  and  buckling  on  his 
sword  once  more,  during  Shays's  rebellion  in  1787^  to  defend 
the  courts  of  justice  at  Concord.  A  man  of  strong  mind, 
determined  will,  benevolent  as  he  was  brave,  liberal  even 
beyond  his  means,  of  courteous  manners,  the  pride  of  his 
neighborhood,  delighting  to  show  kindness  and  hospitality 
to  his  old  fellow-soldiers,  he  died  at  length  on  the  13th  of 
October,  1795,  on  the  verge  of  threescore-years-and-ten,  and 
was  buried  with  military  honors. 

He  left  a  name,  I  need  not  say,  not  only  to  be  honored  in 
its  own  right,  as  long  as  Bunker  Hill  shall  be  a  watchword  of 
heroism  and  patriotism  in  our  land,  but  to  be  borne,  as  it  has 
been,  with  eminent  distinction  by  his  only  son,  the  learned 
and  admirable  judge  and  jurist,  and  by  his  accomplished  and 
distinguished  grandson,  beloved  by  all  who  knew  him,  whose 
"  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  "  and  "  Conquest  of  Mexico  and 
Peru  "  and  "  History  of  Philip  H."  were  the  earHest  triumphs 
in  American  historical  literature,  and  were  achieved  under 
infirmities  and  trials  that  would  have  daunted  any  heart  which 
had  not  inherited  a  full  measure  of  the  bravery  we  are  here  to 
commemorate. 

Nor  may  I  wholly  omit  to  recognize  the  interest  added  to 
this  occasion  by  the  presence  of  a  venerable  lady — his  only 
surviving  grandchild — who,  apart  from  those  personal  gifts 
and  graces  to  which  I  should  not  be  pardoned  for  alluding, 
brings  to  the  memories  of  this  hour  another  illustrious  name 
in  American  history — the  name  of  Dexter — associated,  in  one 
generation,  with  high  national  service  in  the  Senate  and  in 
the  cabinet,  and,  in  two  generations,  with  eminent  legal  learn- 
ing, ability  and  eloquence. 

But  I  must  not  dwell  longer  on  any  personal  topics,  how- 


J 


WILLIAM  PRE  SCOTT  A  T  BUNKER  HILL,         389 

ever  attractive,  and  must  hasten  to  a  conclusion  of  this  ad- 
dress. 

I  have  said,  fellow-citizens,  that  we  were  here  to-day,  to  ful- 
fill a  long-postponed  obligation,  to  pay  a  long-deferred  debt. 
But  let  me  not  be  thought  for  a  moment  to  imply  that  there  is 
anything  really  lost,  anything  really  to  be  regretted,  as  we 
now  unveil  this  noble  statue,  and  hail  it  henceforth,  for  all 
years  to  come,  as  the  frontispiece  and  figure-head  of  this  con- 
secrated ground.  The  lapse  of  time  may  have  evinced  a  want 
of  quick  appreciation  on  the  part  of  others,  but  it  has  taken 
away  nothing  from  the  merits  or  the  just  renown  of  Prescott.. 
On  the  contrary,  it  has  given  an  additional  and  most  impres- 
sive significance  to  this  memorial,  far  more  than  a  compensa- 
tion for  any  delay  in  its  erection. 

I  would  by  no  means  undervalue  or  disparage  the  sponta- 
neous tributes  which  so  ofteti,  have  immediately,  or  late,  fol- 
lowed the  deaths  of  distinguished  men,  here  and  elsewhere, 
and  which  are  fast  adorning  so  many  of  the  public  squares 
and  parks  of  our  countr>' — at  Washington,  at  New  York,  and 
in  Boston,  as  well  as  in  other  of  our  great  cities — with  the 
bronze  or  marble  forms  of  those  who  have  been  lost  to  our 
civil  or  military  service.  Such  manifestations  are  possible  in 
our  day  and  generation,  when  wealth  is  so  abundant  and  when 
art  is  so  prolific.  They  would  have  been  all  but  impossible 
for  us,  a  century,  or  even  half  a  century,  ago.  They  do  honor 
to  the  men  who  are  the  subjects  of  them.  They  do  honor  to 
the  natural  and  irrepressible  emotions  which  prompt  them. 
Like  the  decorations  of  the  soldiers'  graves,  or  the  dedication 
of  the  soldiers'  homes,  they  challenge  and  receive  the  sympa- 
thies of  all  our  hearts.  They  are,  however,  the  manifestations 
of  the  moment,  and  bespeak  but  the  impulses  of  the  hour. 

But  when  it  was  my  privilege,  just  a  quarter  of  a  century 
ago,  to  inaugurate,  and  give  the  word  for  unveiling,  the  first 
bronze  statue  which  had  ever  been  erected  in  the  open  air 
within  the  limits  of  Boston,  and  when  I  reflected  that  nearly 


390  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

seveilty  years  had  then  elapsed  since  the  death,  and  more  than 
a  hundred  and  fifty  years  since  the  birth,  of  Benjamin  Frank- 
lin, whom  that  statue  so  admirably  portrayed ;  when,  more 
recently,  the  statue  of  Samuel  Adams  was  unveiled  at  the  old 
North  End  of  our  city,  nearly  eighty  years  after  his  death,  and 
almost  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  his  birth ;  and  when 
later  still,  two  hundred  and  ninety-two  years  after  his  birth, 
and  two  hundred  and  thirty-one  years  after  his  death,  the 
statue  of  John  Winthrop  was  seen  standing  in  yonder  Scollay 
Square,  with  the  charter  of  Massachusetts  in  his  hand,  look- 
ing out  upon  the  great  city'  of  more  than  three  hundred  and 
fi*fty  thousand  inhabitants,  which  he  had  founded — I  could 
not  help  feeling  that  an  accumulated  interest,  an  enchanced 
and  augmented  glory  would  gather  around  those  memorials 
for  every  year  which  had  been  allowed  to  pass  since  they 
were  so  richly  deserved ;  and  that  the  judgment  of  posterity 
had  at  last  confirmed  and  ratified  the  award,  which  history 
had  long  ago  pronounced,  upon  the  merits  of  those  whom 
they  represented. 

And  so  again,  emphatically,  here,  to-day,  inaugurating  this 
splendid  statue  of  William  Prescott,  eighty-six  years  after  he 
was  laid  in  his  humble  grave,  a  hundred  and  fifty-five  years 
after  his  birth,  and  a  hundred  and  six  years  after  he  stood, 
where  we  now  stand,  in  command  of  this  momentous  battle, 
we  may  all  well  feel  that  the  tribute  has  not  come  a  day  too 
late  for  his  permanent  fame  and  glory.  We  may  even  rejoice 
that  no  partial  or  premature  commemoration  of  him  had  anti- 
cipated the  hour  when  not  only  the  wealth  of  our  community 
and  the  advancement  of  American  art  should  suffice  for  an 
adequate  and  durable  presentment  of  his  heroic  form,  but 
when  the  solid  judgment  of  posterity  should  have  sanctioned 
and  confirmed  the  opinions  of  our  best  historians,  founded  on 
the  most  careful  comparison  of  the  most  distinct  contempo- 
rary records.  We  recognize  in  such  results  that  history  is 
indeed  the  great  corrector,  the  grand  decider,  the  irreversible 


WILLIAM  PRE  SCO  TT  AT  B  UNKEK  HILL.         39^ 

umpire,  the  magic  touchstone  of  truth.  An  august  posthu- 
mous tribunal  like  that  of  the  ancient  Egyptians  seems  to  rise 
before  us,  open  to  every  appeal,  subject  to  no  statute  of  limita- 
tions— ^to  which  the  prejudices  of  the  moment  or  the  passions 
of  the  multitude  are  but  as  the  light  dust  of  the  balance — and 
pronouncing  its  solemn  and  final  decisions,  upon  the  careers 
and  characters  of  all  whom  it  summons  to  the  bar  of  its 
impartial  and  searching  scrutiny.  • 

Nor  can  there  be,  my  friends,  any  higher  incentive  to  hon- 
est, earnest,  patriotic  effort,  whether  in  the  field  or  in  the 
forum,  than  such  evidences,  and  such  assurances,  that  what- 
ever misapprehensions  or  neglects  may  occur  at  the  moment, 
and  though  offices  and  honors,  portraits  and  statues,  may  be 
withheld  or  postponed,  the  record  will  not  be  lost,  truth  will 
not  perish,  nor  posterity  fail  to  do  that  justice  which  the  jeal- 
ousy, or  the  ignorance,  or,  it  may  be  only  the  inability,  of 
contemporaries  may  have  left  undone. 

It  is  a  most  interesting  part  of  the  story  of  this  day,  that 
when  Prescott  proceeded  to  the  headquarters  of  his  comman- 
der-in-chief. General  Ward,  at  Cambridge,  and  reported  the 
results  of  the  expedition  which  he  had  been  ordered  to  conduct, 
and  had  conducted,  he  added,  perhaps  rashly,  but  with  char- 
acteristic courage  and  confidence,  that  if  he  could  only  have 
three  fresh  regiments,  with  sufficient  equipments^  and  ammu- 
nition, he  would  return  and  retake  the  hill.  I  know  not 
whether  he  was  ever  on  this  spot  again,  from  that  hour  to  the 
present.  But  he  is  here  at  last !  Thanks  to  the  generosity  of 
our  public-spirited  fellow-citizens,  and  thanks,  still  more,  to 
the  consummate  skill  of  a  most  accomplished  American  artist 
— second  to  no  living  sculptor  of  the  world — who  has  given 
his  whole  heart,  as  well  as  the  exquisite  cunning  of  his  hand,  to 
the  work — he  is  here  at  last,  "  in  his  habit  as  he  lived  ! " 

And  now,  before  1  proceed  with  any  poor  words  of  my  own, 
let  the  statue  speak  for  itself,  and  display  the  noble  form 
which  has  too  long  been  concealed  from  your  impatient  sight ! 


392  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.  .       ' 

The  genius  of  Story  presents  him  to  us  now,  in  th^  light 
banyan  coat  and  broad-brimmed  hat,  which  he  is  known  to 
have  thrown  on  during  the  intense  heat  of  the  day  and  of  the 
battle,  in  exchange  for  the  more  stately  and  cumbrous  uni- 
form in  which  he  had  marched  from  Cambridge  the  night 
before,  and  which  may  be  seen  dropped  beneath  his  feet.  His 
eagle  gaze  is  riveted  with  intense  energy  on  the  close-approach- 
ing foe.  With  his  left  hand  he  is  hushing  and  holding  back 
the  impetuous  soldiers  under  his  command,  to  await  his  word. 
With  his  right  hand,  he  is  just  ready  to  lift  the  sword  which 
is  to  be  their  signal  for  action.  The  marked  and  well  remem- 
bered features,  which  he  transmitted  to  his  son  and  grandson, 
and  which  may  be  recognized  on  at  least  one  of  his  living 
descendants,  have  enabled  the  artist  to  supply,  amply  and 
admirably,  the  want  of  any  original  portrait  of  himself.  Noth- 
ing more  powerful  and  life-like  has  been  seen  on  this  hill  since 
he  was  here  before.  -  And  that  very  sword — which  so  long 
adorned  the  library  walls  of  his  grandson,  the  historian,  and 
which  is  now  one  of  the  treasures  of  the  Massachusetts  Histor- 
ical Society — one  of  those  "  Crossed  swords  "  whose  romantic 
story  has  so  often  been  told  in  verse  and  prose, — that  same 
sword  which,  tradition  tells  us,  lie  waved  where  he  now  stands, 
when,  seeing  at  length  "the  buttons  on  the  coats,"  or,  it  may 
have  been,  "the  whites  of  the  eyes,"  of  the  advancing  enemy 
in  their  original  onslaught,  he  first  gave  the  word  "fire!"— 
that  same  sword  I  am  privileged  to  hold  up  at  this  moment  to 
5'^our  view,  if,  indeed,  I  shall  be  able  to  hold  it,  while  it  seems 
ready  to  leap  from  its  scabbard,  and  to  fly  from  my  hand,  to 
salute  and  welcome  its  brave  old  master  and  wearer!  "Ko 
blade  which  ever  came  from  the  forges  of  Damascus,  Toledo 
or  Genoa  was  ever  witness  to  greater  personal  perils,  or  w^s 
ever  wielded  by  a  braver  arm. 

Prescott  stands  alone  here  now.  But  our  little  musetini — 
to  be  reconstructed,  I  trust,  at  no  distant  day,  of  enduriog 
materials  and  adequate  dimensions — already  contains  a  mart^ 


I  THE  FIRST  PRINTED  BOOK  KNOWN,  393 

statue  of  the  glorious  Warren.  The  great  first  martyr  of  the 
Revolution,  and  the  heroic-commander  of  this  earliest  Revolu- 
tionary battle,  are  now  both  in  place.  Around  them  on  other 
parts  of  the  hill,  in  other  years,  some  of  the  gallant  leaders 
who  rushed  to  their  aid  from  other  States,  or  from  other  parts 
of  our  own  State,  will,  it  is  hoped,  be  seen — Pomeroy  and 
^ark  and  Reed  and  Knowlton,  with  Putnam  at  the  head  of 
them  all.  They  will  all  be  welcome,  whenever  they  may  come. 
Primarily  a  Massachusetts  battle,  it  was  peculia  riy  also  a  New 
England  battle ;  and  all  New  England  might  well  be  repre- 
sented on  these  heights.  But  the  pre-eminent  honors  of  this 
occasion  are  paid,  as  they  are  due — ahd  long,  long  overdue — 
to  our  grand  Massachusetts  Middlesex  farmer  and  patriot. 

He  has  returned  ;-:-not  with  three  fresh  regiments  only,  as 
he  proposed,  but  with  the  acclamations  of  every  soldier  and 
every  citizen  within  the  sound  of  what  is  being  said,  or  within 
any  knowledge  of  what  is  being  done  here,  to-day.  He  has 
retaken  Bunker  Hill ;  and  with  it,  the  hearts  of  all  who  are 
gathered  on  it,  at  this  hour,  or  who  shall  be  gathered  upon  it, 
generation  after  generation,  in  all  the  untold  centuries  of 
the  future  1 


THE  FIRST  PRINTED  BOOK  KNOWN. 

In  the  forest  of  Soignies,  in  Brabant,  there  were  in  the 
fifteenth  century  three  priories  occupied  by  Canons  Regular 
of  the  rule  of  St.  Augustin.  Of  these,  history  from  time  to 
time  makes  mention — history  of  art  more  frequently.  It  was, 
for  example,  to  one  of  them  that  the  famous  painterHugo  van 
der  Goes,  over  whose  life  and  works  there  hangs  so  thick  a 
cloud,  retired.  Here  it  was  that  he  spent  his  last  days  among 
the  kindly  friars,  who  by  their  singing  soothed  the  hours 
nrhen  the  darkness  settled  down  upon  his  mind.  Here,  too, 
IS  we  learn,  the  great  Roger  van  der  Weyden  more  than  once 


394  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

came  to  stay;  and  the  priory  of  Groenendael  possessed  at  all 
events  one  picture  by  the  master's  hand.  Curiously  enough 
it  was  in  a  manual  made  for  the  use  of-  the  novices  in  this 
house  that  the  inscriptions  written  under  Roger's  famous 
pictures  for  the  Brussels  town  hall  were  preserved,  which 
have  since  enabled  students  to  identify  as  copies  of  them  the 
beautiful  tapestries  won  by  the  Swiss  from  Charles  the  Bold, 
and  hanging  to-day  in  the  cathedral  at  Berne. 

The  traditions  of  this  society  were  to  some  extent  artistic, 
and  Roger  and  Hugo  do  not  seem  to  have  been  the  only  artists 
who  retired  into  or  visited  their  cloisters.  Hence  it  will  not 
be  surprising  if  future  investigation  enables  us  to  refer  to 
them  some  of  the  productions  of  the  early  school  of  wood- 
cutters and  engravers*  The  forest  of  Soignies  lay  near  to  the 
populous  towns  of  Brussels  and  Louvain.  Religious  houses 
situated  in  it  were  used  as  resting-places  by  the  great  men 
who  had  to  journey  past  them.  They  were  thus  well  suited 
to  be  centers  .from  which  new  ideas  might  radiate. 

The  Canons  Regular  devoted  themselves  not  only  to  re- 
ligion, but,  like  the  "  Fratres  vitae  ommunis,"  to  the  spread  of 
learning  also.  They  contain  among  their  number  not  a  few 
authors  famous  in  their  day.  Such  were  Ruysbroeck,  John 
of  Schoonhoven,  Arnold  Sheyloven,  and  Mark  Mastelyn, 
The  last  mentioned  of  these  left  behind  him  a  book,  entitled 
"  Necrologium  ViridiaVallis,"  which  in  the  year  1630  a  Brussels 
printer  found  it  worth  while  to  publish.  Among  other  per- 
sons mentioned  is  one  Henricus  ex  Pomerio  or  Van  den 
Bogaert,  in  his  day  Prior  of  Groenendael.  It  is  to  this  man 
that  the  reader's  attention  is  more  especially  directed.* 

The  principril  events  of  his  life  may  be  shortly  told.  He 
was  bom  at  Louvain  in  the  year  1382,  in  troublous  times;  he 

•  A  MS.  m  the  Bjbliotheqtic  Royaleat  Brussels  (No.  11,974),  entitled  "Gazophyl!a«ura 
So^tantitn  sjve  historic  sncra  memoris  Sogniae,^'  gives  a  full  list  of  tweqty-<ijEht  of 
Bogaarf»  wntiu^^  It  was  from  this  volume  that  Sandenis  took  his  intormatioQ. 
See  Tar  thlt  and  for  ether  fact;^ connected  with  Bogaert,  M.  Ruelens^s  learned  mono^^a^ 
on  the  *'  Pojncriura  Spirit  uaLe  "  in  the  **  Documents  iconographiques  et  typographi^bei 
_  de  la  BibLlatheque  Ro^ale  de  Belgique.'* 

I 

1 


THE  FIRST  PRINTED  BOOK  KNOWN,      -      395 

studied  at  the  university  of  his  native  town  ;  and,  after  earn- 
ing his  degree,  he  went  off  to  Brussels,  and  there  opened  a 
school.  After  some  time  he  returned  to  Louvain,  bringing 
his  school  with  him,  and  there  in  due  course  he  rose  to  a 
prominent  position  among  his  fellow-townsmen,  becoming 
even  town  secretary.  At  the  age  of  thirty,  however,  he  ap- 
pears to  have  wearied  of.  the  turbulence  of  civic  life,  and, 
following  the  example  of  many  a  man  desirous  of  quiet,  if  not 
for  prayer,  at  all  events  for  study,  he  retired  from  the  world 
and  took  refuge  in  the  priory  of  Groenendael.  In  142 1  we  find 
him  sent  as  prior  to  the  neighoring  convent  of  Sept-Fontaines, 
whichbelonged  to  the  same  order.  Ten  years  later  he  was  raised 
to  the  dignity  of  Prior  of  Groenendael,  but  shortly  afterwards 
was  elected  to  preside  over  the  nuns  of  St.  Barbera  at  Tirle- 
mont — a  position  which  he  held  for  thirteen  years.  At  length, 
at  the  age  of  seventy-two,  and  much  against  his  own  in- 
clination, he  was  again  elected  Prior  of  Groenendael.  He  held 
the  office  for  the  shortest  period  allowable,  and  then  retired 
to  the  solitude  and  peace  of  his  own  cell.  He  died  in  the 
year  1469. 

So  much  for  the  man.  With  his  numerous  works,  his  con- 
troversies with  jealous  rivals,  how  he  was  accused  to  the 
Pope,  how  he  defended  himself  and  was  acquitted — ^with  all 
this  we  have  nothing  to  do.  The  reader's  attention,  however, 
must  be  called  to  the  names  of  two  books  which  appear  in 
the  list  of  his  writings.  They  are  "  Explanationis  figuralis 
super  pater  noster  descriptio,"  and  "  Spirituale  Pomerium,  cum 
figuris."  Recent  investigation  has  shown  that  copies  of  these 
books  are  to  this  day  in  existence ;  and  not  only  so,  but  that 
they  are  the  earliest  books  printed  from  engraved  blocks  of 
wood  to  which  a  date  can  be  assigned  among  those  which  are 
known  to  have  come  down  to  us.  So  far  our  work  has  been 
somewhat  dull ;  but  let  the  reader  take  heart,  for  before  leav- 
ing hita  we  hope  to  be  able  to  discover  a  fact  not  unimportant. 

The  Explanatio  figuralis  proves,  as  we  shall  hereafter  show, 


39^  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GA  ZINE, 

to  be  identical  with  a  block-book  known  as  the  "  Exercitium 
super  Pater  Noster,"  the  only  copy  of  which,  in  its  original 
state,  is  preserved  in  the  Public  Library  at  Mons.  It  was  in- 
cluded among  the  early  books  recently  brought  together  in 
the  gallery  of  Retrospective  Art  in  the  exhibition  at  Brussels. 
Unfortunately,  the  last  two  leaves  are  wanting — the  remainder 
of  the  book  is  in  the  most  perfect  state  of  preservation. 

It  is  a  folio  volume  of  the  same  dimensions  as  the  rest  of 
the  block-books,  and  when  complete  it  consisted  of  five 
sheets.  These  are  only  printed  on  one  side ;  the  other  side 
remains  blank.  The  sheets  are  not  gathered  up  into  a  quire, 
one  inside  another,  but  sewn  one  by  one  into  the  cover,  so 
that  in  turning  over  the  leaves  the  first  page  is  blank,  the 
second  and  third  contain  printed  matter,  the  fourth  and  fifth 
are  blank,  and  so  on.  In  books  printed  in  this  fashion  it  was 
not  uncommon  to  paste  the  blank  sides  together  two  by  two, 
and  then  the  volume  resembled  one  printed  in  the  later  man- 
ner on  both  sides  of  the  paper. 

The  impressions  were  taken,  not  from  a  form  composed  of 
type,  but  from  engraved  blocks  of  wood,  the  whole  of  a  single 
sheet  being  taken  from  one  block.  For  the  printing  of  the 
book,  five  such  blocks  were  required,  each  containing  the 
matter  of  two  consecutive  pages. 

The  contents  of  the  pages  are  all  similar.  In  a  compart- 
ment across  the  top  of  each  are  four  or  five  lines  of  wood-cut 
Latin  text,*  commencing  with  a  sentence  from  the  Lord's 
Prayer,  and  then  proceeding  to  point  out  three  points  worthy 
of  attention  in  connection  with  it.  The  center  of  the  page  is 
occupied  by  a  wood-cut  illustrative  of  these  three  points,  be- 
low which,  in  another  compartment,  are  some  Flemish  verses 
freely  translated  from  the  Latin  lines  above. 

*  For  example,  th*^  text  above  the  fifth  cut  is  : — "  Fiat  voluntas  tua  sicut  in  celo  et 
ill  terra.  Hie  nota  in  seculo  tres  vivorum  defectiones.  Primo  habencium  voluntates 
aclhuc  fractal  quales  sunt  infideles.  Secundo  habencium  perversas,  quales  sunt  mali 
chrifitiani.  Tercio  habencium  imperfectas  quales  sunt  boni.  Et  quia  voluntates  in 
ct;lu  sunL  omaes  integre,  recte  et  perfecte  ideo  ut  sic  in  terra  fiat  ora  ut  supra  et  ce.** 


THE  FIRST  PRINTED  B 


o^eA^lP    -l^^   cover.';/ 


t^  "Ocv^  cviV^  \iv  \\i^  \>oo\l  presenl 

Tcvoti.   T\ve  f^tst,  sV\ows  us  the  brothi 

-^se^i^d  oiv  2L  b^ivk  outside  the  pric 

est.    A  stag  is  seen  among  the  tre 

engaged  in  meditation,  and,  a  scroll 

us  the  direction  of  his  thoughts ;  it 

doce  me  orare."    To  him  there  con 

with  a  small  tablet  on  his  arm ;  h 

pater  noster."    The  figure  of  the 

robes  are  light ;  his  hair  hangs  in 

his  face  is  mild,  and  in  some  deg 

brother  looks  up  at  him  with  more  e 

£nd  in  faces  in  early  wood-cuts.     I 

both  natural  and  easy ;  there  is  a  a 

of  his  garments,  and  an  air  oi  quiet  2 

him. 

These  two  figures — the  brother  a 

appear  in   each  of  the   ten  cuts. 

companion  groups  or  incidents  illu 

the  Lord's  Prayer,  and  explains  th< 

three  points  especially  worthy  of  re 

It  was  long  ago  known  that  the  I 

Paris  possessed  a  copy  of  a  MS.  ec 

Pater  Noster,"  and  illustrated  with  ^ 

without  reason,  considered  to  be  th 

den  Bogaert.    More  recent  investigs 

may  not  be  the  case.    The  prints  w 

MS.  are  impressions  from  the  very  s 

which  the  Mons  block-book — the  re 

printed ;  but  the  blocks  are  in  a  late 

them  on  which  the  Flemish  verses  ^ 

off  before  these   impressions  were 

therefore,  represents  the  same  cuts 

But  there  is  a  more  noticeable  dif 

bJock-book  and  the  prints  in  the  MS 


398  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MAGAZINE, 

the  impressions  are  taken.  The  reader  will  probably  know 
that  in  the  very  earliest  days  of  printing,  long  before  the 
invention  of  movable  types,  impressions  from  a  wood-cut 
block  were  taken,  not  by  means  of  a  press,  but  by  rubbing 
the  back  of  the  sheet  of  paper  while  it  was  in  contact  with 
the  block.  The  block  was,  first  of  all,  thoroughly  wetted  with 
some  form  of  watery  ink,  and  then  the  sheet  of  paper,  well 
damped,  was  placed  in  contact  with  it  and  held  down,  while 
the  operator  carefully  rubbed  the  back  of  it  either  with  his 
hand,  with  a  brush,  or  with  some  kind  of  burnisher.  The  ink 
employed  for  this  purpose  was  alway§  of  a  light  brown  tint. 

Owing  to  the  wetness  of  the  paper  and  the  amount  of  rub- 
bing which  was  necessary  to  produce  a  clear  impression,  the 
back  of  the  papen(^ten  bears  almost  as  clear  an  image  of  the 
block  as  the  front ;  and  the  lines  of  ink  lie  in  deep  furrows, 
which,  in  many  cases,  remain  clear  when  the  ink  itself  has 
faded.* 

But  the  discovery  of  printer's  ink,  an  ink  the  vehicle  of  which 
was  a  greasy  substance,  and  the  possibility  of  thereby  taking 
impressions  by  simple  pressure,  created  a  complete  revolution 
in  the  methods  of  printing.  It  led  to  the  immediate  introduc- 
tion of  the  printing-press,  and  thenceforward  systems  of 
rubbing,  brushing,  or  burnishing  were  laid  aside.  The  inven- 
tion of  printing-ink  bears  the  same  relation  to  the  history  of 
printing  which  that  of  oil-colors  does  to  the  history  of  paint- 
ing. It  does  so  in  this  manner.  When  once  a  printer  had  had 
experience  of  the  use  of  the  more  advanced  method,  he  would 
be  quite  certain  never  to  recur  to  the  old  one.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  new  invention  would 
spread  like  an  electric  flash  over  the  whole  country  at  once, 
though  it  may  be  assumed  that  it  would  not  be  long  in  becom- 
ing generally  known. 

Now,  whereas  the  Mons  block-book  is  printed  in  light  brown 

*  It  will  be  seen  that  it  was  impossible  to  print  on  both  sides  of  a  sheet  of  paper 
by  this  method. 


THE  FIRST  PRINTED  BOOK  KNO  WN.  399 

water-color  ink  by  means  of  rubbing,  the  prints  in  the  Paris 
M3.  are  taken  in  black  ink,  and  give,  so  far  as  I  could  see,  no 
indications  of  having  been  rubbed,  but  rather  pressed  or 
rolled  against  the  wood  block.  Owing  to  their  being  pasted 
down  at  the  corners,  it  is  not  easy  to  be  certain  of  this ;  but, 
so  far  as  can  be  seen,  they  give  every  evidence  of  the  use  of 
some  sort  of  printing-press. 
As  we  shall  hereafter  see,  the  MS.  must  have  been  produced 
•  before  1440,  and  hence  \^e  find  the  date,  resting  upon  certain 
evidence  instead  of  conjecture,  for  the  group  of  block-books 
to  be  before  1440. 

So  far  we  have  spoken  only  of  the  ^Exercitium ;  but  the 
Pomerium  Spirituale  mentioned  among  the  works  of  Henrick 
van  den  Bogaert  has  also  come  down  to  u^n  a  mutilated  form, 
and  it  is  by  means  of  it  that  we  discover  the  very  valuable  Hate 
for  these  volumes.  It  exists  in  the  form  of  a  MS.,  illustrated 
by  cuts  preserved  in  the  Bibliotheque  Royale  at  Brussels,  and 
in  all  respects  similar  to  that  of  the  Exercitium  found  at  Paris. 
Each  volume  consists  of  a  single  six-sheet  quire  in  folio.  In 
both  cases  one  side  of  a  sheet  is  occupied  by  a  wood-cut,  printed 
in  black  ink,  while  the  opposite  page  is  filled  with  MS.  text. 
The  writing  is  nothing  but  a  somewhat  verbose  amplification 
in  Latin  of  the  short  wood-cut  legends  which  appear  on  the 
cuts.  In  the  case  of  the  Pomerium  the  writer  of  the  MS. 
seems  also  to  have  been  its  author,  probably  some  Groenen- 
dael  monk  who  took  the  Prior's  little  book  as  his  text,  and 
proceeded  to  write  a  commentary  on  it ;  or,  possibly,  he  may 
have  been  the  Prior  himself.  The  Paris  Exercitum  is  equally 
obviously  a  copy  by  the  hand  of  a  scribe  taken  line  for  line 
from  a  volume  written  by  some  one  else.  This  is  shown  clearly 
enough  in  one  case,  where  the  copyist  has  turned  over  two 
leaves  of  the  volume  he  was  copying  instead  of  one,  and  has 
therefore  written  the  wrong  line  opposite  to  a  certain  cut.  He 
has  found  out  his  mistake  after  a  word  or  two  and  corrected  it, 
drawing  his  pen  through  them  and  starting  afresh. 


400  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

The  two  MSS.,  therefore,  are  twins,  as  abundant  confirma- 
tory evidence  might  be  adduced  to  prove.  The  style  of  the 
design  of  the  cuts,  of  the  execution,  of  the  wood-cut  letters, 
of  the  treatment  of  the  subjects,'^and  of  the  MS.  is  the  same  in 
.  both  ;  they  are  the  work  of  the  same  hands — ^author,  wood- 
cutter, printer,  commentator — ^and  they  must  belong  to  the 
same  date. 

By  carefully  measuring  the  prints  in  the  Pomerium  MS.,  and 
making  allowance  for  compartments  containing  Flemish  text, 
such  as  those  we  saw  were  cut  off  in  the  case  of  the  Exerci- 
tium,  we  find  that  the  blocks  of  the  former  were  exactly  half 
the  size  of  those  of  the  latter,  and  that  the  original  block-book 
edition  of  the  Pomerium  must  have  formed  a  quarto  volume. 
Such  a  volume  I  have  nowhere  been  able  to  discover,  but  that 
it  has  existed  there  Is  ample  evidence.  We  are  therefore  quite 
prepared  to  credit  the  statement  of  Dumortier*  that  he  had 
seen  the  Pomerium  cuts  united  in  a  small  volume  unaccom- 
panied by  MS. 

The  subject  of  the  "  Pomerium  Spirituale  "  is,  as  its  name 
implies,  allegorical.  A  maiden,  representing  one  of  the  twelve 
virtues,  is  discovered  kneeling  at  the  foot  of  one  of  the  twelve 
trees  of  the  spiritual  orchard — the  symbols  of  the  Divine  attri- 
butes— receiving  the  fruits  of  the  tree.  The  twelve  maidens 
form  subjects  for  meditation  for  the  twelve  hours  of  the  day. 
In  connection  with  each  of  the  maidens  is  represented  and 
described  one  of  the  incidents  of  the  sacred  history,  past  or 
future,  serving  to  exemplify  that  attribute  which  is  the  real 
subject  of  the  picture.  Each  print  is  similar  in  its  general 
design  to  all  the  rest.  The  little  maid  kneels,  sits  or  stands, 
as  the  case  may  be,  under  a  tree  on  the  left,  among  the 
branches  of  which,  on  a  scroll,  is  the  name  of  the  attribute. 
Three  apples,  the  fruits  of  the  tree,  lie  on  the  ground  beside 
her.     Behind  her  is  a  scroll  containing  the  words  which  she 

*  Dumortier— '*  Notes  sur  rimprimerie,"  in  the  Pulletins  de  1' Academic  royalede 
Belgique,  tome  viii.,  1841. 


THE  FIRST  PRINTED  BOOK  KNOWN,  4^1 

addresses  to  her  heavenly  spouse.  Other  inscriptions,  in  dif- 
ferent places,  explain  the  scene.  The  right  and  center  of  the 
cut  are  occupied  by  the  event  from  sacred  history.  The  names 
of  the  three  fruits  are  engraved  in  three  lines,  in  a  compart- 
ment at  the  foot  of  the  cut. 

Lastly,  the  MS.  text  of  the  "  Pomerium  "  distinctly  informs 
us  twice  over  that  the  author  of  the  book  was  Henricus  ex 
Pomerio,  a  canon  regular  of  the  monastery  of  the  Blessed 
Virgin  of  Groenendael.  Twice  over  are  we  told  that  the  book 
was  finished  in  the  year  1440.*  To  this  year,  therefore,  we 
must  refer  both  MSS..  though  that  of  the  "  Exercitum  "  may 
have  been  produced  a  year  or  two  earlier  or  later.  Both  the 
block-books  must  be  dated  before  1440. 

We  cannot  finally  quit  this  subject  without  casting  a  pass- 
ing glance  at  the  style  of  the  execution  of  the  wood-cuts.  It 
is  the  same  in  both  books ;  they  are  obviously  the  work  of 
one  hand,  and  may  be  treated  together.  The  most  marked 
feature  is  the  constant  employment  of  long  pointed  lines, 
placed  closely  side  by  side,  to  shade  large  spaces,  especially 
as  a  sort  of  relieving  shadow  to  detach  the  figures  from  the 
ground.  The  shade  is  for  the  most  part  unpleasantly  flat. 
The  faces  and  features  are  very  similar  in  style  to  those  which 
appear  in  that  most  finished  of  all  the  early  wood-cut  books 
— ^the  "Ars  Moriendi."  But  such  is  not  the  case  with  the 
hair,  which  is  much  less  carefully  arranged  by  the  Groenen- 
dael artist.  The  head,  however,  of  the  kneeling  maiden  is 
sometimes  very  pretty,  with  its  pointed  forehead,  simple  atti- 
tude, and  quiet  look,  the  hair  being  wavy  and  light.  The  real 
fault  of  the  cut  lies  in  the  masses  of  gridiron  shade,  which 
spoil  their  effect  and  add  nothing  to  their  meaning.  Consid- 
ering, however,  their  early  date,  and  the  diflftculties  with  which 

*  The  author's  name  occurs  in  red  at  the  end  of  the  preface.  Further  on  wc  read, 
**£ditum  est  hoc  spirituale  pomerium  i)er  fratrem  Henricum  ex  pomerio  canonicum 
i^larem  profcssum  in  monasterio  beatae  Mariae  viridis  vallis."  On  the  last  page  is 
wnttcn,  '*  Explicit  spirituale  pomerium  editun\  anno  domini  m"cccc™»xl«"«  ; "  then  fol- 
lows a  prayer  of  eight  lines ;  and  then,  "  Explicit  est  sup.  spirituale  pomerium  editum 
et  complctum,  Anno  domini  m"cccc''xl«»  deo  gratias." 


402  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

the  artist  must  have  had  to  contend,  it  must  be  allowed  that 
he  has  attained  an  excellence  of  finish  in  the  arrangement 
and  shaping  of  his  lines  of  no  low  order. 

To  sum  up,  then.  The  conclusions  which  an  examination 
of  these  volumes  enables  us  to  assert  are  as  follows : — Some 
time  before  the  year  1440,  Henrick  van  den  Bogaert  wrote  a 
little  work  entitled  "Spirituale  Pomerium."  He  employed 
some  artist  living  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  priory  of  Groenen- 
dael,  and  possibly  one  of  the  brothers  themselves,  to  engrave  it 
upon  blocks  of  wood  with  accompanying  illustrations,  from 
which  impressions  might  be  taken  by  the  recently  introduced 
process  of  printing.  Nor  was  this  the  only  work  of  his  so 
treated,  but  about  the  same  period  there  appeared,  in  a  similar 
but  larger  form  the  "  Exercitium  super  Pater  Noster  "  by  the 
same  author  and  artist.  At  a  later  time,  in  the  year  1440,  the 
former,  and  probably  both  books,  was  taken  in  hand  again,  it 
may  well  have  been  by  the  author  himself — the  blocks  were 
trimmed  by  the  removal  of  the  Flemish  portions  of  the  text 
now  no  longer  required,  and  impressions  were  taken  from 
them  by  a  more  advanced  process  of.  printing.  The  prints 
thus  made  were  pasted  into  a  volume  of  blank  paper,  pages 
being  left  plain  for  the  addition  of  a  MS.  commentary  of  a 
more  extensive  kind  than  that  admitted  by  the  limited  space 
available  on  the  cuts  themselves. 

The  earliest  printing-press,  therefore,  to  which  both  a  date 
and  a  locality  can  at  present  be  assigned  was  used  near  Groen- 
endael,  in  the  forest  of  Soignies,  in  the  province  of  Brabant, 
before  the  year  1440,  While  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  further 
investigations  may  enable  us  to  group  together  other  block- 
books  as  the  productions  of  the  same  press,  it  is  quite  possi- 
ble that  they  may  reveal  to  us  the  existence  of  other  centers 
of  printing  activity  at  dates  considerably  earlier. 

*    M.  W.  Conway,  in  The  Academy. 


L 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT.  403 


THE  REVISED  VERSION  OF  THE  ENGLISH  NEW 
TESTAMENT. 

A  revision  of  the  English  Authorized  Version  could  not 
have  been  much  longer  deferred.  By  the  year  1870,  when  the 
Revision  Companies  were  appointed,  public  opinion  had 
become  quite  matured  upon  the  subject.  The  period  for 
debate,  extending  in  real  earnest  from  about  1856,  was  over, 
and  the  period  for  action  had  arrived.  A  very  healthy  tone 
had  gradually  come  to  prevail  upon  the  question.  Oh  the  one 
hand,  all  thought  of  adding  another  to  those  many  "  Improved 
s^ersions,"  which  had  turned  out  such  conspicuous  failures, 
was  abandoned.  On  the  other  hand,  that  idle  sentiment  which 
strove  for  long  to  regard  the  Authorized  Version  as  something 
too  sacred  ever  to  be  touched,  had,  by  the  date  referred  to, 
talked  and  written  itself  out.  Scholars  connected  with  the 
various  churches  in  our  country  were  all  but  unanimous  in 
the  conviction  that  neither  as  respects  text  nor  translation 
could  the  common  English  Version  of  the  New  Testament  be 
regarded  as  satisfactory.  As  to  the  text  on  which  the  Author- 
ized Version  was  founded,  it  was  well  known  to  have  rested 
on  the  slightest  critical  materials,  a  point  which  will  be  more 
particularly  adverted  to  afterwards.  And  as  to  the  translation, 
the  mere  fact  that  more  than  tv/o  centuries  and  a  half  had 
elapsed  since  it  was  formed,  was  of  itself  enough  to  suggest, 
without  going  into  points  of  lexical  or  grammatical  correct- 
ness, that,  owing  to  the  inevitable  changes  always  taking 
place  in  language,  it  could  not  but  call  for  revision  and  recti- 
fication. 

Accordingly,  when  the  Convocation  of  Canterbury,  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1870,  adopted  certain  resolutions  in  favor  of  instant 
revision,  it  showed  itself  for  once  a  true  exponent  and  inter- 
preter of  national  opinion.  The  particular  resolutions  which 
were  adopted  did  the  utmost  credit  to  the  shrewd  sense  as 


404  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

well  as  the  catholic  spirit  of  the  body  which  had  now  under-  { 
taken  to  deal  with  the  question.  This  will  be  plain  from  the 
following  extracts.  After  declaring  (i)  "That  it  is  desirable 
that  a  revision  of  the  Authorized  Version  of  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures be  undertaken,"  and  (2)  *'  That  the  revision  be  so  con- 
ducted as  to  comprise  both  marginal  renderings  and  such 
emendations  as  it  maybe  found  necessary  to  insert  in  the  text 
of  the  Authorized  Version,"  Convocation  added  the  following: 
(3)  "  That  in  the  above  resolutions  we  do  not  contemplate  any 
new  translation  of  the  Bible,  or  any  alteration  of  the  language, 
except  when  in  the  judgment  of  the  most  competent  scholars 
«uch  change  is  necessary ; "  (4)  "  That  in  such  necessary 
changes,  the  style  of  the  language  employed  in  the  existing 
version  be  closely  followed ;"  (5) "  That  it  is  desirable  that  Con- 
vocation should  nominate  a  body  of  its  own  members  to  under- 
take the  Work  of  revision,  who  shall  be  at  liberty  to  invite 
the  co-operation  of  any  eminent  for  scholarship,  to  whatever 
nation  or  religious  body  they  may  belong." 

The  golden  mean  was  thus  indicated  between  undue  conser- 
vatism and  unnecessary  alteration.  The  constitution  of  the 
New  Testament  Company  was  also  strikingly  liberal.  Among 
its  twenty-seven  members,  all  the  leading  religious  commun- 
ions in  our  country  were  represented.  Side  by  side  with 
bishops,  deans,  and  other  dignitaries  of  the  Church  of  England, 
there  sat,  on  a  footing  of  perfect  equality,  scholars  connected 
with  the  Presbyterian,  Congregational,  Wesleyan,  Baptist,  and 
Unitarian  churches.  It  may  be  regarded  as  a  striking  proof 
how  well-timed  was  the  movement  for  revision,  that  scarcely 
one  of  the  divines  invited  to  join  the  Company  declined  to 
serve. "  Only  Dr.  Tregelles,  influenced  by  considerations  oi 
health,  and  Dr.  (now  Cardinal)  J.  H.  Newman,  whose  co-Qper- 
ation  could  hardly  have  been  anticipated,  failed  to  come  for- 
ward in  response  to  the  call  of  Convocation.  Moreover,  not 
one  of  the  original  members  of  the  Company  whom  time  has 
spared,  ceased  to  act  up  to  the  very  conclusion  of  the  w©ck«J 


'       THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT.  4^5 

Several  lamented  losses  were  incurred,  through  death,  atmong 
the  members — Bishop  Wilberforce,  Dean  Alford,  and  Dr. 
Eadie,  all  dying  within  a  few  years  after  the  commencement 
of  the  work  ;  but  the  only  resignation  which  took  place  was 
that  of  the  present  Dean  of  Ely,  who  did  not  at  first  belong  to 
the  members  of  the  Company. 

The  work  thus  begun  on  June  22,  1870,  has  been  uninter- 
ruptedly carried  forward  during  the  last  ten  and  a  half  years. 
Altogether,  the  Company  have  held  over  100  sessions,  each 
session  consisting  of  four  days,  and  the  members  sitting  each 
day  for  seven  hours.  This  statement  is  of  itself  sufficient 
to  suggest  how  great  labor  and  pains  have  been  expended 
on  the  task  in  hand.  The  result  is  before  us  in  the  Kevised 
Version  just  published ;  and  what,  let  us  now  inquire,  are  the 
practical  gains  which  have  been  secured  ? 

There  need  be  no  hesitation  in  saying  at  once,  that,  both  as 
regards  text  and  translation,  an  immense  advance  has  been 
made  on  the  Authorized  Version.  We  are,  indeed,  far  from 
supposing  that,  in  either  of  these  respects,  the  ne  plus  ultra 
of  perfection  has  yet  been  reached.  Readings  have  here 
and  there  been  preferred  which  do  not  commend  themselves 
to  our  acceptance,  and  renderings  have  occasionally  been 
adopted  from  which  we  very  strongly  dissent.  But  both  these 
points  were,  in  every  case,  determined,  as  they  only  could  be, 
by  the  decision  of  a  majority  of  the  Revisers;  and  few  indeed 
are  the  instances  in  which  the  present  writer  differed  from 
his  colleagues,  compared  with  the  vast  number  of  cases  in 
which  the  judgment  of  the  majority  of  the  Company  had  his 
cordial  concurrence.* 

♦  I  may  give  in  a  note,  without  lengthened  argument,  2t,  few  examples  of  various  kind$ 
of  changes  for  the  worse,  which  have,  in  my  opinion,  been  accepted  in  the  Revised 
Version.  First,  the  text  adopted  at  Luk«  ii.  14  seems  to  roe  utterly  to  spoil  the  paral- 
lelism, while  it  bsirdly  yields  %  tensei,  And  Is,  besides,  opposed  to  9,  vast  amount  of  exter- 
Ral  cvidene«i  Secondly,  I  think  an  error^has  becn^committed  in  introducing  a  personal 
refef^ne^  to  S*tan  in  the  translation  of  <Xlt6  rov  itoyj^ftov,  given  at  Matt.  vi.  13. 
Thifdiy,  the  two  verses,  Acts,  i,  j8,  19,  have,  quite  against  the  Greek,  been  printed,  as 
apj^Fpnthesis,  s^nd  this,  apparently  with  the  view  of  avoiding  a  fancied  difficulty, 
vhioh  rwUy  does  not  €>cUt.  Speaking  generally,  it  seems  to  me  that  too  many  minuta 
variations  from  the  Awthoriawi  Version  have  been  admitted.  _         ^ 


406  ,  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Readers  of  the  Revised  Version  will  be  strongly  tempted 
to  do  it  injustice  on  a  first  perusal.  Their  predominant  feel- 
ing will  be  one  of  disappointment  and  regret.  They  will  miss 
altogether  certain  passages  with  which  they  have  been  fa- 
miliar all  their  days,  and  will  be  ready  to  say  that  in  everv 
chapter  the  rhythm  of  the  Authorized  Version,  which  has 
charmed  their  ears  from  infancy,  is  unpleasantly  disturbed. 
But  the  prejudice  thus  apt  to  be  excited  should  be  resisted 
and  laid  aside.  The  one  vital  question  in  every  case  is 
whether  or  not  evidence  and  argument  are  in  favor  of  the 
Revised  Version ;  and,  if  so,  the  changes  which  have  been 
made  should  be  gratefully  accepted.  Let  us  consider  this 
point  both  as  respects  text  and  translation. 

As  is  well  known,  the  Bible  was  the  first  book  ever  printed, 
but  that  was  the  Latin  Bible.  A  splendid  edition  of  it,  of 
which  some^highly  prized  copies  are  still  in  existence,  came 
forth  from  the  printing-press  of  Gutenberg  and  Fust  at  Mentz 
in  1452.  The  Hebrew  Bible  had  also  been  published  under 
the  auspices  of  some  wealthy  Jews  in  1488.  But,  what  seems 
at  first  strange,  no  edition  of  the  New  Testament  in  the 
original  was  issued  from  the  press  within  the  century  which 
witnessed  the  invention  of  printing.  The  Songs  of  the  Virgin 
Mary  and  Zacharias  were  the  only  portions  printed,  as  an 
appendix  to  a  Greek  edition  of  the  Psalms,  before  the  begin- 
ning of  the  eventful  sixteenth  century.  The  reason  of  this 
curious  fact  doubtless  was  that  the  Greek  language  was  as 
yet  hardly  known  in  Western  Europe.  But  the  "  new  learn- 
ing" was  everywhere  spreading;  editions  of  the  ancient 
classics  were  pouring  from  the  press ;  and  an  edition  of  the 
Greek  New  Testament,  superintended  by  Erasmus,  at  last 
came  out  in  1516,  the  year  which  marked  the  birth-throes  of 
the  Reformation, 

It  is  right,  however,  to  state  that,  while  the  edition  of 
Erasmus  was  the  first  actually  published,  one  had  been  printed 
some  little  time  before.    This  is  known  as  the  Complutenslan 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT.  A^7 

edition  (from  Complutum,  the  Latin  name  of  Alpala  in  Spain, 
where  it  was  printed),  and  was  prepared  under  the  auspices 
of  the  excellent  and  accomplished  Cardinal  Ximenes.  The 
printing  of  the  New  Testament  was  finished  on  January  lo, 
1514,.  but,  for  various  reasons,  it  was  not  published  till  six 
years  afterwards.  In  the  meantime,  Erasmus  had  a  request 
addressed  to  him  on  April  17,  1 51.5,  by  Froben,  an  eminent 
publisher  at  Basle,  that  he  would  immediately  set  about  the 
preparation  of  an  edition  of  the  Greek  Testament.  Erasmus 
"was  at  that  time  in  England,  and  on  receipt  of  Froben's  com- 
munication he  immediately  fell  to  work.  His  industry,  then 
as  ever,  was  prodigious;  and  he  actually  had  out  his  first 
edition  of  the  Greek  New  Testament,  with  Latin  notes,  form- 
ing a  large  folio  of  1,027  pages,  before  a  3'ear  had  passed,  the 
date  of  the  work  bemg  February,  1516.  Here,  then,  wc  find 
the  beginning  of  our  Authorized  Version.  The^irst  edition 
of  Erasmus  constituted  the  basis  of  that  text  on  which  our 
common  English  Version  was  formed.  He,  no  doubt,  in- 
troduced changes  into  subsequent  editions — some  of  them 
by  ho  means  improvements — and  alterations  were  afterwards 
made  by  Stephens,  Beza,  and  other  editors ;  but,  without 
gnoing  into  details,  it  may  simply  be  stated  that  when,  in  1604, 
at  the  command  of  King  James,  our  translators  began  the 
preparation  of  the  present  Authorized  Version,  the  Greek 
text  which  they  used  was  one  substantially  the  same  as  the 
fourth  edition  of  Erasmus,  published  in  1 527.  What,  then, 
let  us  inquire,  were  the  critical  materials  on  which  that  edition 
rested  ? 

It  has  already  been  hinted  how  hurriedly  Erasmus  flung 
forth  his  first  edition  of  the  New  Testament.  As  he  himself 
said,  "  it  was  rather  tumbled  headlong  into  the  world  than 
edited."  In  his  haste,  he  laid  hold  of  those  Greek  manu- 
scripts which  lay  nearest  to  his  hand,  and  these  happened  to 
be  both  few  and  inferior  in  character.  They  are  still  to  be 
seen  at   Basle,  bearing  the  marks  of  having  been  used  as 


408  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA  GAZINE. 

"  copy "  for  the  printer.  Of  the  one  good  manuscript  to 
which  Erasmus  had  access  he  made  but  little  use.  The  au- 
thority he  principally  followed  was  a  manuscript  which  the 
monks  at  Basle  had  bought  for  two  florins,  and  small  as  was 
this  price,  modern  scholars  have  declared,  on  examining  the 
document,  that  it  was  quite  enough.  What  could  be  expected 
as  the  result  but  the  production  of  a  very  erroneous  text  ? 
And  still  more  remains  to  be  said  on  this  point.  For  the 
book  of  Revelation,  Erasmus  had  only  one  copy,  and  even 
that  was  not  complete.  The  last  six  verses  were  altogether 
wanting,  and  the  great  scholar  had  no  means  of  supplying 
them,  except  through  his  own  imagination  and  erudition. 
Unwilling  to  send  forth  a  mulitated  edition  to  the  world,  he 
took  the  Latin  version  of  the  missing  verses,  and  conjec- 
tu rally  re-translated  them  into  Greek.  The  remarkable  fact 
consequently  is  that,  in  the  common,  uncritical  editions  of 
the  Greek  Testament,  circulating  in  our  own  day,  there  are  a 
number  of  Greek  words,  which,  so  far  from  having  been 
written  by  St.  John,  can  be  traced  no  higher  than  to  the 
learned  guesses  of  Erasmus. 

By  the  time  his  fourth  edition  was  published,  Erasmus  had 
seen  the  work  of  Cardinal  Ximenes,  and  took  advantage  of 
it  to  clear  away  many  of  the  erroneous  readings  he  had  at 
first  adopted,  especially  in  the  book  of  Revelation.  But  the 
Complutensian  text  had  itself  been  based  on  manuscripts  of 
modern  date  and  little  authority.  Nor  did  subsequent  editors 
do  much  to  improve  the  text  down  to  the  date  of  our  Au- 
thorized Version.  The  only  manuscript  of  the  first  class  to 
which  they  had  access  was  that  now  known  as  D,  containing 
only  the  Gospels  and  Acts  in  Greek  and  Latin,  and  belonging 
to  the  sixth  century.  This  manuscript  was  once  the  property 
of  the  Reformer  Beza,  but  he  was  afraid  to  use  it.  He  thought 
its  readings  dangerous,  as  they  certamly  are  often  peculiar ; 
and  both  he  and  those  who  followed  him  down  to  the  reign 
of  King  James,  adhered  substantially  to  that  text  which 


1. 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,  4^9 

we  have  seen,  was  founded  on  such  a  slender  basis  by  Eras- 
mus. 

The  plain  truth  then  is,  that  our  common  English  version 
rests  upon  a  Greek  original  Which  can  claim  almost  no  crit- 
ical authority.  At  the  time  of  its  preparation,  none  of  the 
sources  of  a  pure  text  were  available.  The  citations  of  the 
New  Testament  found  m  the  early  Fathers  had  not  been  care- 
fully examined.  The  ancient  versions  had  not  been  critically 
studied.  The  most  valuable  manuscripts  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment had  not  been  discovered.  In  a  word,  the  science  of 
textual  criticism  had  not  yet  come  into  existence. 

During  the  two  centuries  and  a  half  which  have  passed^ 
away  since  then^this  science,  like  others,  has  made  prodig- 
ious strides.  Many  most  able  and  learned  men  have  devoted 
themselves  to  its  cultivation.  In  England,  the  names  of  Wal- 
ton, Mill  and  Bentley;  and  in  Germany,  the  names  of  Gries- 
bach,  Lachmann,  and  Tischendorf,  are  honored  as  those  of 
the  great  departed,  who  have  made  it  the  object  of  their  Jives  ^ 
that  the  very  words  of  Scripture  should,  as  far  as  possible,  be 
recovered.-  And  the  question  simply  is,  shall  not  the  results 
of  tkeir  labors  be  made  known  to  English  readers  ?  While 
everything  else  has  advanced,  and  while  the  very  poorest  now 
have  access  to  advantages  and  comforts  which  could  not  be 
enjoyed  by  the  wealthiest  two  centuries  ago,  shall  we  continue 
to  stand,  in  regard  to  the  purity  of  the  text  of  God's  Word, 
at  the  point  where  our  ancestors  stood  when  the  Authorized 
Version  was  formed  ?  This  is  a  question  which  admits  of  but 
one  clear  and  decided  answer,  and,  accordingly,  the  text  from 
-which  the  Revised  Version  of  the  New  Testament  has  betn 
formed  is  one  which  has,  in  multitudes  of  passages,  departed 
from  -that  text  which  constituted  the  basis  of  onr  .common 
Eng^lish  translation. 

But  while  changes  due  to  this  cause  will  be  found  in  every 
chapter,  most  of  them  are  of  very  little  importance.  It  is  only 
on   rare  occasions  that  the   differences  of  reading  mvolve 


4 lO  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

questions  of  doctrine,  or  can  otherwise  be  regarded  as  of  very 
great  consequence.  Before  proceeding  to  consider  those  pas- 
sages of  which  all  will  recognize  the  significance,  let  us  glance 
at  some  of  the  minor  changes  which  have  been  made,  both 
asinteresting  in  themselves  and  as  illustrating  the  principles 
which  have  been  adopted  by  textual  critics. 

At  Mark  vi.  20  the  Authorized  Version  runs  as  follows :  "  For 
Herod  feared  John,  knowing  that  he  was  a  just  man  and  a 
holy,  and  observed  him;  and  when  he  heard  him  he  did  many 
things,  and  heard  him  gladly."     But  in  the  Revised  Version 
the  passage  stands  thus :  "  For  Herod  feared  John,  knowing* 
that  he  was  a  just  man  and  a  holy,  and  kept  him  safe ;  and 
when  he  heard  him,  he  was  much  perplexed^  and  heard  hini 
gladly."    Here,  there  are,  no  doubt,  many  ancient  authorities 
in  favor  of  the  reading  represented  in  the  common  version. 
But,  notwithstanding,  it  can  hardly  be  questioned  on  critical 
principles  that  that  reading  is  erroneous.    The  difference  be- 
tween the  two  versions  springs  from  the  fact  that  in  the  one 
text  a  very  common  verb  is  found,  while  a  very  uncommon 
verb  occurs  in  the  other.    Now,  Biblical  scholars  have  adopted 
the  principle  that,  where  there  are  conflicting  readings,  one 
which  is  difficult  or  unusual  is,  in  general,  to  be  preferred  to 
another  which  is  easy  and  common.    The  reason  for  this  rule 
is  evident.    On  the  one  hand,  a  transcriber  was  strongly 
tempted  to  change  an  expression  or  a  construction  which  he 
did  not  understand  into  another  with  which  he  was  quite  fa- 
miliar, and  which  seemed  to  suit  the  context.    On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  obvious  that  there  was  no  temptation  to  alter  a 
common  word  or  construction  into  one  that  was  unusual  and 
could  only  be  comprehended  with  difficulty.    This  one  con» 
side  ration  leaves  little  room  for  doubt  as  to  the  true  reading- 
in  the  passage  before  us.    We  can  easily  fancy  a  copyist  being 
stumbled  by  the  very  rare  word  rjicopzi^  and  changing  it  into 
the  common  iicoiti ;  but  the  opposite  process  it  is  nearly  im- 
possible to  imagine.    There  is  a  different  critical  principle 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,  4^1 

which  comes  into  operation  at  such  passages,  as  Acts  viii.  37 
and  I  Cor.  vi.  20.  Additions  have,  in  both  these  passages, 
been  made  to  the  true  text.  The  first  verse  referred  to  is  a 
baptismal  formula,  which  appears  in  some  copies  of  the  New 
Testament  to  have  crept  in  from  the  margin,  and  which  must, 
on  every  ground  of  evidence,  be  dismissed.  In  the  second 
passage,  again,  these  words — "  and  in  your  spirit,  which  are 
God's  " — seem  to  have  been  inserted  with  the  mistaken  view 
of  promoting  edification.  It  is  quite  plain,  however,  to  one 
who  considers  the  apostle's  line  of  argument  in  the  passage, 
that  the  added  words  are  wholly  out  of  place ;  and,  in  point  of 
evidence,  they  have  in  fact  hardly  any  support.  The  exhorta- 
tion of  St.  Paul  appositely  ends  with — "  Glorify  God  therefore 
in  your  body,"  just  as  his  reasoning  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Ro- 
mans is  forcibly  summed  up  at  chap.  viii.  i,  in  these  compre- 
hensive words:  "There  is  therefore  now  no  condemnation  to 
them  that  are  in  Christ  Jesus  " — ^without  the  enfeebling  and 
unsupported  addition  here  found  in  the  Authorized  Version. 
Since,  then,  the  sacred  text  was  apt,  in  various  ways,  to  be 
added  to.  Biblical  critics  have  adopted  this  other  general 
principle  that  a  shorter  reading  is  usually  to  be  preferred  to 
a  longer.  If  we  now  turn  to  i  John  ii.  23,  we  shall  find  a  pas- 
sage which  calls  forth  a  different  line  of  remark.  It  will  be 
observed  that  the  second  half  of  that  verse  is  printed  in  italics 
in  the  Authorized  Version,  to  indicate  a  doubt  as  to  its  gen- 
uineness. No  such  brand,  however,  attaches  to  it  in  the  Re- 
vised Version,  and  modem  criticism  pronounces  quite  de- 
cidedly in  its  favor.  How  then  did  it  come  to  be  omitted  m 
some  even  of  the  best  manuscripts  ?  The  answer  is  that  this 
was  due  to  the  fact  that  the  two  clauses  of  the  verse  end  with 
three  words  exactly  the  same  in  Greek.  The  eyes  of  some 
transcribers  were  thus  deceived.  They  wrote  the  first  clause, 
and  then  on  looking  up  from  their  work  to  the  copy  before 
them,  their  glance  fell  on  the  last  words  of  the  second,  and 
supposing  from  the  appearance  which  these  presented  that 


412  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

they  had  just  writteh  it,  they  were  led  to  omit  the  clause  alto- 
gether. These  words  and  clauses  of  like  ending  have  been  a 
very  fruitful  cause  of  omissions  in  the  manuscripts,  but,  the 
cause  of  the  mistake  being  so  obvious,  there  is  usually  little 
difficulty  in  making  the  necessaiy  correction. 

Having*  thus  given  some  examples  of  those  minor  changes 
of  text  which  are  represented  in  the  Revised  Version,  with 
the  reasons  which  may  be  assigned  for  the  various  readings, 
we  now  pass  on  to  notice  those  more  important  omissions  and 
alterations  which  will  be  observed  in  the  revised  translation. 
The  first  instance  of  omission  which  will  probably  strike  the 
English  reader  is  that  of  the  doxology  to  the  Lord's  Prayer. 
These  words  (Matt.  vi.  13),  "  For  thine  is  the  kingdom,  and  the 
power,  and  the  glory,  for  ever.  Amen  ; "  have  entirely  disap- 
peared in  the  Revised  Version.  The  state  of  the  evidence  is 
as  follows :  The  words  in  question  are  not  quoted  or  com- 
mented on  by  the  earliest  of  the  Fathers,  even  by  those  of 
them,  such  as  Origen,  who  formally  expounded  the'  Lord's 
Prayer ;  they  never  existed  in  the  Latin  versions,  and  they  are 
not  found  in  the  two  oldest  manuscripts,  B  and-  K,  both  be- 
longing to  the  fourth  century,  nor  in  D  ;  while  A  and  C,  both 
dating  from  the  fifth  century,  are  here  unfortunately  defective. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  words  are  found  in  the  ancient  Syriac 
version,  formed  perhaps  in  the  second  century,  but  apparently 
conformed  at  a  later  d^te  to  the  text  prevailing  in  the  Church, 
so  that  its  authority  loses  much  of  the  weight  it  would  other- 
wise possess  ;  and  they  are  also  found  in  the  great  majority 
of  the  later  manuscripts,  but  in  varying  forms,  always  a  sus- 
picious circumstance.  What  then,  are  we  to  conclude  re- 
specting the  words  ?  If  evidence  is  to  decide,  as  evidence  alone 
ought  to  decide,  there  can  hardly  be  a  doubt  that  they  did  not 
exist  in  the  original  text,  but  crept  into  it  from  some  of  the 
ancient  Liturgies.  This  is  a  conclusion  which  some  may 
regret,  or  even  refuse  to  accept.  But  it  should  be  remembered 
that  unless  a  strict  adhesion  to  critical  principles  is  maintained 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,  4IJ 

in  dealing  with  Scripture,  all  must  soon  become  uncertainty 
and  confusion ;  and  that,,  if  we  defy  the  laws  of  evidence  in 
regard  to  any  one  passage  which  is  wished  to  be  retained,  we 
cannot  logically  appeal  to  these  laws  either  for  the  exclusion 
or  retention  of  other  passages. 

We  now  turn  to  Mark  xvi.  9-20  (close  of  St.  Mark's  Gospel). 
Quotations  are  made  from  this  passage  by  Irenaeus  and  other 
very  early  writers.  It  is  found  in  all  the  ancient  versions.  It 
exists  in  A,  C,  D — ^three  of  the  five  great  Uncials — and  in 
almost  all  the  other  Greek  manuscripts.  But,  while  there  can 
thus  be  no  question  as  to  the  canonical  authority  of  the  pas- 
sage, there  is  not  a  little  doubt  respecting  its  authorship. 
Eusebius,  the  father  of  ecclesiastical  history  (circ.  A.  D.  330), 
tells  us  that  the  section  did  not  exist  in  the  best  manuscripts 
in  his  day.  And  when  we  look  into  &<,  we  find  that  the  verses 
are  wholly  wanting.  When,  again,  we  turn  to  B,  we  see  that 
in  it,  too,  the  verses  are  wanting ;  but  a  space  is  left  vacant,- 
indicating  that  the  transcriber  was  aware  of  the  existence  of 
the  passage.  The  internal  evidence  is  still  more  decisive 
against  the  belief  that  the  section  proceeded  from  St.  Mark. 
No  fewer  than  seventeen  expressions  occur  in  its  twelve 
verses,  which  are  found  nowhere  else  in  the  second  Gospel. 
The  difference  of  style  is  perceptible  even  to  a  reader  of  the 
English  version,  and  far  more  so  to  one  who  peruses  the  pas- 
sage in  the  original.  We  cannot  tell  why  St.  Mark  stopped  at 
the  end  of  the  8th  verse.  That  must  have  been  due  to  acci- 
dent, and  not  intention.  The  evangelist  could  never  have 
meant  to  end  his  work  with  the  wor^^  "  for  they  were  afraid." 
No  history  that  was  ever  given  to  the  world  intentionally 
closes  with  such  abruptness.  The  last  word  is  actually  a  con- 
junction, being  the  Greek  expression  corresponding  to  the 
English  "  for.**  But  such  a  termination,  while  it  could  not 
have  beeij  intentional,  may  have  been  caused  by  accident.  We 
know,  for  instance,  how  many  works  have  been  left  unfinished 
owing  to  the  sudden  death  of  their  authors.    This  was,  doubt- 


414  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE. 

less,  the  reason  why  the  history  of  Thucydides  ends  so 
abruptly.  This,  too,  was  the  reason  why  the  great  epic  of 
Virgil  was  left  with  so  many  of  its  lines  incomplete.  And 
every  one  knows  and  regrets  that  it  was  owing  to  the  sudden 
death  of  Lord  Macau  lay  that  his  history  is  only  a  magnificent 
fragment.  So  St.  Mark  may  never  have  had  it  in  his  power  to 
complete  the  Gospel  as  he  intended.  But  that  does  not  in  the 
least  detract  from  the  authority  of  its  last  twelve  verses,  while 
the  fact  of  their  being  due  to  a  different  authorship  really  im- 
parts to  them  an  additional  interest  and  importance.  They 
undoubtedly  come  to  us  from  the  period  of  the  Apostles,  and 
thus  furnish  a  practical  attestation  that  the  second  Gospel 
was  accepted  in  the  Church  even  from  the  earliest  times. 

We  must  next  look  at  another  long  passage,  which  stands 
on  much  the  same  footing,  viz.,  St.  John  vii.  53 — viii.  1 1  (the 
woman  taken  in  adultery).  That  section  is  wholly  wanting  in 
A,  B,  C,  K,  while  it  occurs  in  a  peculiar  form  in  D,  and  is  not 
found  in  the  best  versions.  Internal  evidence  is  also  strongly 
against  it.  The  style  is  entirely  different  from  that  of  St 
John,  and  the  passage  has  no  connection  with  the  context 
Besides,  some  manuscripts  do  not  insert  it  here,  but  have  it  at 
the  end  of  Luke  xxi.,  which  seems  a  far  more  fitting  place  for 
it.  Taking  all  these  facts  into. consideration,  the  almost  unani- 
mous opinion  of  modern  critics  is  that  the  paragraph  formed 
no  part  of  the  original  Gospel  of  St.  John.  At  the  same  time, 
all  agree  that  the  narrative  is  eminently  Christian  in  sentir 
mcnt,  3.nd  probably  quite  historical  as  to  the  facts  stated.  It 
thus  comes  to  us  as  one^of  the  very  few  genuine  narratives 
connected  with  Christ,  which  have  reached  us  outside  of  the 
New  Testament.  The  reason  why  this  one  has  been  pre- 
served, while  multitudes  of  others  that  must  have  been  prev- 
alent in  the  early  Church  passed  away,  is  that  it  secured  for 
itself  in  many  copies  a  place  within  the  sacred  inclosurc  "of 
the  Scriptural  text. 

We  may  now  pass  to  a  brief  consideration  of  the  fam< 


'«%J 


,    THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,  4^5 

passage,  r  John  v.  7,  8.     The  reader  will  observe  that  these 
words — "in  heaven,  the   Father,  the  Word,  and  the   Holy- 
Ghost  :  and  these  three  are  one  " — have  been  omitted  in  the 
Revised  Version,  so  that  the  passage  reads  as  follows :  "  For 
there  are  three  that  bear  record,  the  Spirit,  and  the  water,  and 
the  blood ;  and  these  three  agree  in  one."    All  reference  to 
the  "  three  heavenly  Witnesses "  thus  disappears,  and  the 
most  popular  of  all  texts  in  proof  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Trin- 
ity has  no  longer  a  place  in  the  New  Testament.    This  is  one 
of  the  most  certain  results  of  textual  criticism.    The  words 
referred  to  are  as  undoubtedly  spurious  as  the  first  verse  of 
St.  John's  Gospel  is  genuine.    They  are  not  quoted  or  referred 
to  by  any  of  the  early  Fathers,  even  when  expressly  treating 
of  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity.    They  do  not  exist  in  any  of 
the  ancient  versions,  except  the  Latin,  and  not  in  the  best 
copies  even  of  that.    They  are  not  found  in  any  of  the  ancient 
manuscripts,  nor  indeed  in  any  Greek  manuscript  at  all,  except 
two,  respecting  which  it  is  the  settled  conviction  of  Biblical 
critics  that  the  words  have  been  translated  from  the  Latin. 
Nothing,  therefore,  is  more  certain  than  that  the  passage  did 
not  exist  in  the  original  text  of  the  New  Testament.   It  seems 
to  have  been  foisted  into  the  Latin  in  the  supposed  interests 
of  orthodoxy,  and  has  not  been  thought  worthy  of  notice  even 
on  the  margin  of  the  Revised  Version. 

But  what  criticism  takes  away  in  the  above  passage,  it 
rnakes  up  for  at  i  Pet.  iii.  15.  There  the  Authorized  Version 
reads,  "  But  sanctify  the  Lord  God  in  your  hearts."  There  is, 
however,  very  feeble  support  for  this  reading.  All  the  great 
manuscripts.  A,  B,  C,  ^C,  with  the  best  versions  and  several  of 
the  Fathers,  sanction  the  following  as  the  true  text :  "  But 
sanctify  the  Lord  Christ  in  your  hearts."  Now,  this  is  a  change 
of  the  greatest  doctrinal  importance.  To  see  that  such  is  the 
case  it  must  be  noticed  that  the  Apostle  is  here  quoting  from 
Isa.  viii.  13.  And,  as  he  applies  to  Christ  language  which  is  in 
the  Old  Testament  made  use  of  with  reference  to  Jehovah, 


4l6  .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

there  can  be  no  question  that  he  takes  for  granted  the  supreme 
Godhead  of  the  Saviour. 

Another  passage  presenting  various  readings  of  great  inter- 
est rs  found  at  i  Tim.  iii.  i6.  The  question  there  is  whether 
we  are  to  jead  "  God  "  or  "who."  Previous  to  the  discovery 
of  K.  some  twenty  years  ago,  the  Alexandrian  manuscript  (A) 
was  here  of  supreme  importance,  as  being  the  only  great 
Uncial  containing  the  passage.  From  the  worn  and  faded 
condition  of  the  manuscript  at  the  place,  and  from  the  fact 
that  there  is  very  little  difference  in  the  forms  for  "God"  and 
"who,"  as  written  in  ancient  Greek  documents,  the  utmost 
variety  of  opinion  existed  among  Biblical  critics  as  to  the  side 
which  A  really  favored.  Both  the  great  Vatican  manuscript 
(B),  and  the  Ephraem  manuscript  (C)  are  here  defective,-so 
that  the  Sinaitic  manuscript  (&5)  has  supreme  weight  in  hece 
establishing  the  true  text.  And,  as  it  clearly  reads  "  who," 
there  is  now  no  doubt  that  we  should  read,  as  in  the  Revised 
Version,  "  He  who  was  manifested  in  the  flesh." 

The  results  reached  by  criticism  may  be  regarded  as  certain 
with  respect  to  all  the  passages  which  have  yet  been  noticed. 
But  it  is  not  so  in  regard  to  these  two  important  texts.  Acts 
XX.  28,  and  Col.  ii.  2.  The  renderings  of  these  adopted  in  the 
Revised  Version  can  only  be  viewed  as  resting  upon  readings 
in  favor  of  which  a  slight  probability  may  be  pleaded.  And 
no  one  who  examines  the  amount  of  the  evidence  on  either 
side  will  attach  much  less  weight  to  the  readings  which  have 
in  these  passages  been  placed  on  the  margin  than  to  those 
which  have  been  admitted  into  the  text. 

We  now  proceed  more  briefly  to  look  at  some  of  those 
changes  which  are  due  to  an  amended  rendering  of  the  text 
of  the  Authorized  Version. 

Positive  mistakes  of  the  Greek  have  been  corrected.  We  may 
turn  for  an  example  to  Acts  iii.  19,  20.  The  Authorized 
Version  here  presents  an  instance  of  sheer  mistranslation; 
and  it  is  important  in  the  interests  of  eschatology  that  the 


•      THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,  A^l 

error  should  be  corrected.  It  is  impossible  that  the  Zitoo^  ocv  of 
the  original  can  be  translated  "when ;  "  the  only  proper  ren- 
dering is,  "  in  order  that,"  and,  with  this  meaning,  it  dominates 
the  verb  not  only  in  the  19th,  but  also  in  the  20th,  verse.  The 
proper  translation  is,  as  in  the  Revised  Version,  *'  Repent  ye 
therefore,  and  turn  again,  that  your  sins  may  be  blotted  out, 
that  so  seasons  of  refreshing  may  come  from  the  presence  of 
the  Lord ;  and  that  he  may  send  the  Christ  who  hath  been 
appointed  for  you  (even)  Jesus."  For  another  example  of 
mistranslation,  let  us  look  at  Gal.  v.  17,  as  it  stands  in  the 
Authorized  Version.  We  there  read,  "  For  the  flesh  lusteth 
against  the  Spirit,  and  the  Spirit  against  the  flesh ;  and  these 
are  contrary  the  one  to  the  other;  so  that  ye  cannot  do  the 
things  that  ye  would**  This  rendering  completely  inverts  the 
meaning.  In  the  original  it  is  "  the  Spirit "  and  not  "  the 
flesh,"  which  is  represented  as  the  conquering  power;  and  the 
proper  translation  is  that  of  the  Revised  Version — "  For  the 
flesh  lusteth  against  the  Spirit,  and  the  Spirit  against  the  flesh  ; 
for  these  are  contrary  the  one  to  the  other;  that  ye  may  7tot 
do  the  things  that  ye  would.''  For  other  examples  of  mis- 
translation in  the  Authorized  Version  we  refer  the  reader  to 
Matt.  xiv.  8 ;  Luke  xviii.  12 ;  Acts  xxvi.  28 ;  i  Tim.  vi.  5 ;  Heb. 
xi.  13,  etc. 

Mistakes  in  Greek graminar  have  been  rectified.  This  might 
be  largely  illustrated  with  respect  to  several  points.  It  is  seen 
with  reference  to  the  article ;  the  Authorized  Version  some- 
times inserts  it  without  any  sanction  from  the  original,  as  at 
John  iv.  27,  "  they  marveled  that  he  talked  with  the  woman," 
instead  of  "they  marveled  that  he  talked  with^  woman,"  the 
meaning  being  thus  perverted  and  obscured.  More  frequently 
it  omits  the  article  when  found  in  the  Greek,  as  so  often  before 
the  official  title  "  Christ "  in  the  Gospels,  and  as  at  2  Thess.  ii.  3, 
*•  except  there  come  a  falling  away  first,"  for  "  the  falling  away," 
the  definite  apostacy  in  question.  Sometimes,  again,  the 
article  is  over-translated  as  a  demonstrative  pronoun,  as  at 

L.  M. — 14 


4l8  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

John  i.  21,  "Art  thou  that  prophet?"  for  ''the  prophet/'  and 
in  many  other  places.  The  same  incorrectness  appears  in  the 
renderings  of  Greek  tenses.  Aorists  are  constantly  trans- 
lated as  perfects,  and  though  this  is  necessary  and  proper  in 
some  passages,  there  are  many  others  in  which  the  strict 
grammatical  rendering  of  the  tense  should  be  adhered  to,  as 
at  Matt.  vii.  22,  "  Did  we  not  prophesy  ?  "  instead  of  "  Have  we 
not  prophesied  ?  "  On  the  other  hand,  perfects  are  sometimes 
translated  as  aorists,  to  the  detriment  of  the  sense,  as  at  Luke 
xiii.  2,  where  the  proper  rendering, "  because  they  have  suffered 
these  things,"  indicates  the  recent  character  of  the  calamity. 
Imperfects  are  frequently  translated  as  aorists,  and  fine  f)oints 
indicated  in  the  original  are  thus  concealed,  as  at  Mark  xv.  6, 
"  he  released  unto  them  one  prisoner,"  for,  '*  he  used  to  release 
unto  them  one  prisoner."  See  also  Luke  i.  59;  v.  6,  etc. 
Further,  the  Greek  prepositions  are  oftan  mistranslated.  One 
example  out  of  multitudes  is  seen  at  2  Peter  iii.  12,  where, 
instead  of  " The  day  of  God  wherein"  the  proper  rendering 
ia  "  The  day  of  Grod,  by  reason  of  which'*  Compare  Rom.  iii. 
25 ;  Heb.  vi.  7,  etc. ;  and  for  an  improper  translation  of  other 
prepositions  see  Luke  xxiii.  42 ;  2  Thess.  ii.  i,  etc. — in  a  word,  1 
the  number  of  grammatical  errors  in  the  Authorized  Version 
is  so  great  that  it  would  take  many  pages  simply  to  enumerate 
them. 

Unintelligible  archaisms  have  been  removed  and  proper  names 
consistently  translated.  Of  course  no  attempt  has  been  made 
to  impart  a  modern  air  to  the  Revised  Version.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  antique  style  has  been  carefully  preserved,  as  shed- 
ding a  sort  of  solemnity  about  the  sacred  volume.  But  a  num- 
ber of  terms  which  are  now  obscure  or  misleading  have  been 
replaced  by  others.  It  is  sufficient  to  mention  "  prevent," 
which  occurs  with  the  sense  of  "  anticipate  "  at  Matt.  xvii.  25 ; 
I  Thess.  iv.  15 ;  "  ensue,"  which  is  used  for  "  pursue  "  at  i  Peter 
iii.  II ;  and  "  conversation,"  which  means  "  conduct  "  at  GaLi. 
3;   and  many  other  passages.    As  to  proper  names,  tbe 


\ 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT.  419 

greatest  confusion  prevails  in  the  Authorized  Version.  We 
find  Timotheus  and  Timothy,  Lucas  and  Luke,  Marcus  and 
Mark,  Midian  and  Madian,  etc.,  variously  employed  in  re- 
ferring to  the  same  persons  or  places.  This  is  often  most 
misleading  to  plain  readers,  especially  in  regard  to  the  name 
"Jesus,"  which  is  twice  employed,  not  to  denote  Christ,  but 
Joshua,  the  leader  of  the  people  of  Israel  (Acts  vii.  45  and 
Heb.  iv.  8).  It  borders  on  the  grotesque  to  find  Kish  spoken 
of  as  "  Cis,"  Hosea  as  "  Osee,"  Jeremiah  as  "Jeremy  " ;  and  it 
is  credibly  reported  that  even  dignitaries  of  the  Church  have 
been  known  to  treat  the  New  Testament  form  of  Korah  as  a 
monosyllable,  while  they  read  in  the  epistle  of  Jude  of  "  the 
gainsaying  of  Core**  All  these  points  have,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  been  rectified  in  the  Revised  Version. 

Consistency  has,  asfar  as  possible,  been  maintained  in  translating 
the  same  Greek  words.  Variation  is,  of  course,  to  some  extent 
a  necessity,  since  the  same  word  has  different  meanings  in 
different  passages.  The  only  question,  therefore,  is  whether 
our  translators  have  not  varied  their  renderings  unnecessarily 
and  unreasonably,  so  as,  in  fact,  to  have  diminished  the  value 
of  their  work.  That  such  is,  in  reality,  the  case  might  be  very 
largely  evinced.  But  here  a  few  illustrations  only  can  be 
given.  At  1  Peter  ii.  4,  5,  we  read,  "  To  whom  coming,  as  unto 
a  living  stone,  disallowed  indeed  of  men,  but  chosen  of  God, 
and  precious,  ye  also,  as  lively  stones,  are  built  up,"  etc.,  the 
very  same  word  being  thus  variously  translated  in  the  two 
clauses,  and  the  identification  of  Christ's  life  with  that  of  his 
people  being  thus  to  some  degree  obscured.  The  very  same 
words  rendered  "  thy  faith  hath  saved  thee  "  at  Luke  vii.  20,  and 
xviii.  42,  appear  as  "thy  faith  hath  made  thee  whole  "  at  Luke 
viii.  48,  and  xvii.  19.  At  chapter  vi.  20  of  the  same  Gospel  we 
find  the  words  "  blessed  be  ye,"  while  the  very  same  Greek 
words  are  rendered  "  blessed  are  ye  "  in  the  next  and  following 
verses.  Exactly  identical  expressions  are  variously  repre- 
sented in  the  several  Gospels.    Compare,  for  instance,  Matt^ 


420  "       .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

xxvii.  45;  Mark  xv.  33;  Luke  xxiii.  44.  Quotations  from  the 
Old  Testament  repeated  in  the  same  language  in  different 
passages  are  very  variously  rendered,  as  at  Heb.  iii.  1 1  and 
Heb.  iv.  3,-  etc.  Different  degrees  of  force  are  given  to  the 
very  same  Greek  words  in  different  passages,  as  at  Matt.  xvii.  5, 
compared  with  Mark  ix.  7,  and  in  multitudes  of  other  places. 
Now,  all  this  needless  variety  of  rendering  must  be  very  per- 
plexing to  an  English  reader,  must  often  lead  him  to  imagine 
differences  in  the  original  which  do  not  exist,  and  must  go  far 
to  deprive  him  of  the  advantage  which  might  be  derived  from 
comparing  one  passage  in  which  a  particular  expression 
^occurs  with  another  in  which  the  same  word  or  phrase  is_ 
employed. 

'  Unnecessary  confounding  of  one  Greek  word  with  unotJrer  in 
trafislation  has  bee^t  avoided.  This  is-the  opposite  error  to  that 
which  has  just  been  noticed,  and  admits  of  large  illustration 
from  the  Authorized  Version.  Let  the  following  examples 
suflicie.  Three  different  terms  are  alike  translated  "  bright- 
ness." The  first  occurs  at  Acts  xxvi.  13 — "  I  saw  in  the  way  a 
light  from  heaven  above  the  bright7iess  of  the  sun  " — a  per- 
fectly correct  translation.  The  second  is  found  at  2  Thess. 
\\.  8,  "  shall  destroy  with  the  brightness  of  his  coming,"  and 
this  passage  furnishes  an  instance  of  sheer  mistranslation. 
The  word  rendered  "  brightness  "  is  in  every  other  passage  (i 
Tim.  vi.  14;  Tit.  ii.  13,  etc.)  translated  "appearing,"  and  should 
always  have  some  such,  meaning  assigned  to  it.  The  third 
term  occurs  in  the  striking  passage,  Heb.  i.  3,  **  who  being  the 
brightness  of  his  glory,"  and  is  found  nowhere  else  in  the  New- 
Testament.  It  denotes  the  flashing  forth  of  radiance,  and  not 
a  mere  reflected  splendor,  as  might  be  inferred  from  the 
Authorized  Version  :  it  should  therefore,  be  translated  by  some 
such  expression  as  "  effulgence."  Again,  two  very  different 
terms  are  alike  translated  "  hell  "  in  the  Authorized  Version^ 
and  this  sometimes  grates  very  harshly  on  the  reader.  A  bold 
attempt  has  been  made  in  the  revised  translation  to  escaipe 


r 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT.  4^1 


this  result  by  transferring  the  word  "  Hades "  into  our  lan- 
guage, while  "  hell "  is  reserved  for  the  other  expression. 
This  attempt  deserves  to  prove  successful,  as  it  serves  to  dis- 
tinguish between  the  abode  of  the  dead,  or  the  region  of  dis- 
embodied spirits,  and  the  popular  conception  of  hell.    The 
gain  thus  secured  is  strikingly  seen  in  such  verses  as  Acts  ii. 
27,  31,  where  it  is  almost  dreadful  to  read  of  Christ's  soul  not 
having  been  "left  in  hell."    The  meaning,  of  course,  is  that 
he  was  not  left  in  the  region  of  the  dead  ;  and  the  revised 
translation  therefore  is,  "  Because  thou  wilt  not  leave  my  soul 
in  Hades,  neither  wilt  thou  give  thy  Holy  One  to  see  corrup- 
tion."   Once  more,  as  is  well  known,  two  very  different  words 
are  alike  translated  *'  beast "  and  "  beasts "  in  the   Book  of 
Revelation.    The  one  simply  denotes  "  living  creature,"  while 
the  other  is  properly  rendered  "  beast."    The  worst  results 
have  followed  from  confounding  them — from  translating  the 
word  which  occurs,  for  instance,  at  Rev.  iv.  6,  by  the  same 
term  in  our  language  as  that  which  is  found  at  xiii.  i.    It  is» 
indeed,  simply  horrible  to  read  (chap.  v.  14)  that  "  the  four 
beasts  said.  Amen  ;"  and  when  the  necessary  corrections  have 
been  made,  as  in  the  Revised  Version,  an  English  reader  can-;, 
not  fail  to  have  much  additional  pleasure  in  perusing  the 
Apocalypse. 

Such,  then,  are  a  few  illustrations  of  what  has  been  done  to 
amend  the  English  New  Testament,  both  as  respects  text  and 
translation.  And  nov/  the  question  naturally  suggests  itself, 
What  is  to  be  the  fate  of  the  Revised  Version  ?  That  is  a  ques- 
tion which  can,  of  course,  be  definitely  answered  only  after 
the  Version  has  passed  through  the  ordeal  of  public  opinion. 
But,  judging  by  analogous  cases  in  the  past,  there  is  little  rea- 
son to  be  sanguine  as  to  the  favorable  reception  which  awaits 
it,  at  least  in  the  immediate  present.  We  know  how  high  the 
Vulgate  now  stands  in  the  estimation  of  the  Church  of  Rome. 
Well,  that  is  substantially  the  revision  of  the  Old  Latin  made 
by  St.  Jerome  in  the  fifth  century.    And  how  was  his  work 


422  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

received  when  it  appeared  ?  Why,  it  was  condemned  with  the 
greatest  severity,  and  lie  himself  assailed  with  the  utmost  vir- 
ulence, while  the  greatly  improved  version  which  he  had  pro- 
duced did  not  obtain  general  acceptance  in  the  church  till 
after  a  period  of  200  years  !  Think  again  how  dear  to  every 
one  is  now  our  existing  Authorized  Version,  how  proud  we 
are  of  its  general  faithfulness  as  well  as  its  noble  style,  and 
how  attached  to  its  sweet  and  solemn  utterances.  And  how 
^  was  //  ushered  into  the  world  ?  Why,  it  lay  neglected  ai^d  de- 
spised for  the  first  fifty  years  of  its  existence,  while  one  of  the 
greatest  scholars  of  the  age  declared  that  he  "  would  rather 
be  torn  in  pieces  by  wild  horses  than  impose  such  a  version 
on  the  poor  churches  of  England"!  How  then  can  it  be 
expected  that  the  new  revision  will  escape  the  fate  of  those 
which  have  preceded  it  ?  The  present  writer  well  remembers 
that  when,  as  a  Company  of  Revisers,  we  first  took  our  seats 
around  the  long  table  in  the  Jerusalem  Chamber,  the  Bishop 
of  Gloucester  and  Bristol,  who  has  throughout  acted  as  chair- 
man, plainly  warned  us  not  to  be  over-sanguine  as  to  the  im- 
mediate success  likely  to  attend  our  work.  And  he  had 
expressed  the  same  thing  previously  in  his  "  Considerations 
on  the  Revision  of  the  English  Version  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment."   His  words  (p.  221),  were : 

Even  with  the  most  prospered  issues,  a  generation  must  pass  away  ere  the  labors  of 
the  present  time^will  be  so  far  recognized  as  to  take  the  place  of  the  labors  of  the  past. 
The  youngest  scholar  that  may  be  called  upon  to  bear  his  part  in  the  great  undertak- 
ing will  have  fallen  on  sleep  before  the  labors  in  which  he  may  have  shared  will  bo 
regarded  as  fully  bearing  their  hoped-for  fruit.  The  latest  survivor  of  the  gathered 
company  will  be  resting  in  the  calm  of  Paradise,  ere  the  work  at  which  he  toiled  will 
meet  with  the  reception  which,  by  the  blessing  of  Qod  the  Holy  Ghost,  it  may  ulti<. 
mately  be  found  to  deserve.  The  bread  will  be  cast  upon  the  waters,  but  it  will  not  be 
found  till  after  many  days. 

This  may  appear  too  despondent  a  view  to  take  of  the  matter, 
but  it  is  certainly  one  which  is  confirmed  by  all  past  ex- 
perience. The  old  words  of  Scripture,  with  which  our  ears 
have  been  familiar  from  childhood,  possess  an  indescribable 
"harm,  and  w«  can  hardly  be  persuaded  to  part  with  them  for 


THE  REVISED  NEW  TESTAMENT,        '      4^3 

others,  however  more    accurately  these  may  represent  the 

original.     But  while  this  is  so,  there  can,  at  the-  same  time, 

be  no  doubt  that  the  Revised  Version  will  gradually  win  its 

way  to  public  acceptance,  if  it  deserves  to  do  so.     Beyond  all 

question  it  will  be  subjected  to  a  vast  amount  of  criticism, 

much  of  which  will,  doubtless,  be  intelligent,  and  not  a  little, 

probably,  the  reverse.    Considering  the  long  time  which  lias 

been  taken  in  its  preparation,  and   how  many  minds  have 

aided  in  suggesting  the  amendments  which  it  embodies,  there 

seems  little  likelihood  that  anything  new  will  emerge  in  the 

discussions  it  may  excite,  anything,  that  is,  which  was  not 

considered  by  the  Company.    There  is  a  well-known  story 

connected  with  the  Authorized  Version,  to  the  effect  that  a 

certain  scholar  sent  the  translators  five  reasons  in  favor  of 

a  particular  rendering,   but     was  answered    that  they  had 

already  had  the  suggestion  before  them,  and  had  found  fifteen 

reasons  for  rejecting  it.    Something  like  this  will,  doubtless 

occur  again,  and  will  combine  with  many  other  causes  to 

occasion  delay  in  the  acceptance  of  the   Revised   Version. 

•Yet  who  can  tell  but,  in  these  times  of  ours,  when  everything 

is  so  rapidly  accomplished,  a   favorable  ,  reception  may  be 

gained  for  this  new  edition  of  the  English  Testament  at  an 

earlier  date  than  its  best  friends  now  venture  to  anticipate  ? 

At  any  rate,  the  utmost  confidence  may  be  felt  that  no  rash 

changes  have  been  made ;  that  every  effort  has  been  put  forth 

to  render  the  work  as  faithful  a  transcript  of  the  original  as 

possible  ;  that  neither  ecclesiastical  nor  theological  prejudices 

have  been  allowed  the  slightest   influence  in   molding  the 

translation ;  and  that  the  one  object  aimed  at  has  been  to 

cause  the  light  of  Divine  truth  to  shine  with  a  brighter  luster 

on  the  minds  of  those  who  are  indebted  for  an  acquaintance 

with  it  solely  to  the  English  language. 

Alexander  Roberts,  D.  D.,  in  Eraser's  Magazine. 


424  THE  UBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 


SIR  DAVID  BREWSTER  AND  SIR  JOHN  HERSCHEL. 

Already,  in  these  brief  reminiscences,  I  have  spoken  of 
divines,  novelists,  and  essayists.  Incidentially,  allusion  has 
also  been  made  to  poets.  The  two  distinguished  masters  of 
physical  philosophy  whose  names  are  written  at  the  head  of 
the  present  paper,  may  well  be  taken  as  representatives  of 
the  men  of  science  with  whom  my  earlier  business  projects 
brought  me  into  contact.  In  settling  the  programme  of  Grood 
Words,  the  desirability  of  popularizing  science  was  one  of  the 
aims  kept  in  view.  I  may  now  venture  to  say  that  this  deal- 
ing with  scientific  topics  in  the  pages  of  a  magazine  which 
was  to  be  offered  for  Sunday  as  well  as  week-day  reading,  was 
felt  to  have  some  riskiness  about  it.  At  least,  there  was  need, 
for  care  in  selecting  the  writers.  If  it  would  be  too  much  to 
assert  now,  as  it  most  certainly  would  be,  that  Science  and 
Religion  are  in  Literature  reconciled,  it  may  at  least  be  stated 
that  they  are  not  so  fiercely  hostile  as  they  were  twenty  years 
ago.  One  might  almost  say  that  religious  teachers  and  the 
younger  men  of  science  then  were  in  open  feud.  Mr.  Darwin's 
"  Origin  of  Species  "  had  just  been  published,  and  had  caused 
an  excitement  in  the  religious  world  which  did  more  than 
bring  back  the  only  half-abated  tumult  and  heat  arouseyd  by 
"The  Vestiges  of  Creation."  There  is  nothing  issuing  from 
the  press  to-day  approaching  in  polemical  bitterness  to  the 
loud  debates  of  that  stormier  time.  Darwinism  survives,  but 
so  also  does  religion ;  and  it  then  was  thought  by  a  good 
many  people  that  this  double  result  was  not  possible.  Some 
of  those,  however,  with  whom  I  was  then  working,  had  hearts 
too  brave  to  fear  for  the  future  of  Chiistianity. 

"  We  cannot  leave  science  out  of  the  mag^ines,"  said  Dr. 
Norman  Macleod  to  me  in  one  of  our  preliminary  talks.  "  And 
there  is  no  cause  why  we  should  do  so.  The  thing  to  make 
sure  of  is  that  Christianity  is  not  left  out  of  the  science  we 


BREWSTER  AND  HERSCHEL,  425 

put  in.  Thank  God,"  he  added,  "  we  have  Christian  philos- 
ophers still  left  among  us,  as  the  world  always  will  have." 

Dr.  Macleod,  I  believe,  had  some  acquaintance  with  the 
Herschel  family  on  Lady  Herschel's  side.  He  made  applica- 
tion to  Sir  John,  and  received  a  kind  promise  in  the  matter. 
The  appeal  to  Sir  David  Brewster  fell  to  my  lot;  and  I  com- 
municated with  him,  in  the  first  instance,  by  letter.  At  this 
time  I  had  not  removed  from  Edinburgh ;  and,  owing  to  his 
connection  with  the  University,  I  had  opportunities  from 
time  to  time  of  seeing  Sir  David's  easily-recognized  figure. 
I  had  not  had  the  good  fortune  of  being  acquainted  with  him, 
and  only  knew  him  by  sight.  By  repute,  of  course,  every- 
body knew  him.  That  held  good,  indeed,  of  Europe,  no  less 
than  of  Britain.  There  is  no  scientific  man  to-day  nearly  so 
popularly^  known  as  he  was  then.  He  was  always  coming 
before  the  public  in  some  fresh  way,  announcing  some  new 
discovery.  But  to  one  who,  like  myself,  had  chosen  publish- 
ing for  his  business  in  life,  Sir  David  Brewster  was  interest- 
ing, not  alone  as  the  scientific  discoverer  and  the  academic 
dignitary,  but  as  the  editor  of  a  "  Cyclopaedia,"  before  the 
long  lines  of  the  volumes  of  which  I  had  often  stood  in  ad- 
miration. I  was  jiecessarily  aware,  too,  of  his  far-back  con- 
nection with  The  Edinburgh  Review  and  The  North  British 
Review,  for  which  latter  publication  I  need  not  hesitate  to 
confess  an  early  predilection.  I  very  well  remember  the.  kind 
of  professional  gratification  I  felt  when  I,  at  length,  found 
myself  in  relation  with  one  whose  association  with  literature 
included  all  the  leading  publications,  and  went  back  so  far. 
But  I  am  hurrying  on  a  little  too  quickly. 

It  was  not  until  the  spring  of  1862  that  I  was  honored  by  a 
visit  from  Sir  David  at  my  office,  immediately  after  his 
earliest  paper  had  appeared  in  Good  Words.  A  partial  break- 
down in  his  health  had  delayed  his  writing  for  the  magazine. 
This  first  contribution  attracted  a  good  deal  of  public  notice, 
for  it  was  entitled  "The  Facts  and  Fancies  of  Mr.  Darwin/* 


i26  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA  GAZINE. 

and  it  was  written  with  not  a  little  of  Sir  David  Brewster's 
indsiveness  of  style.  In  the  opening  sentence  he  asserted 
that  Mr.  Darwin's  book  contained  "  much  valuable  knowledge 
and  much  wild  speculation  " ;  and,  as  was  natural,  starting 
from  this  point  of  view,  the  critic  dwelt  more  upon  the  latter 
division  than  the  former.  Nearly  Sir  David's  Brewster*s  first 
words  upon  entering  the  room  on  the  second  floor  of  No.  42 
George  street,  Edinburgh,  which  then  formed  my  office,  were, 
"  I  hear  that  some  of  Mr.  Darwin's  friends  think  I  used  too 
sharp  language ;  but  I  adhere  to  all  I  said.  He  is  very  clever, 
but  a  surprisingly  loose  reasoner.  A  capital  observer ;  I  fully 
admit  that."  Sir  David  went  on  to  speak  very  kindly  of  the 
magazine,  and  unhesitatingly  condemned  some  of  the  op- 
position it  was  then  meeting  with  in  certain  religious  quar- 
ters. Science  and  religion,  he  repeated  several  times  during 
the  interview,  must  be  one,  since  each  dealt  with  Truth,  which 
had  only  one  and  the  same  Author.  His  aged  face  lighted 
up  with  wonderful  fire  as  he  asked,  "  Did  Newton  ever  doubt 
it,  or  was  he  a  smaller  man  than  some  of  these  we  have  now.^ 
But  who  is  it  who  demurs  to-day  ?  Not  Herschel,  not  Fara- 
day." Most  assuredly,  I  thought  to  myself,  it  was  not  Sir 
David  Brewster  who  did  so,  for  the  light  of  faith  was  visible 
in  his  eyes  as  he  spoke.  It  was  the  light  of  faith  touched 
with  just  some  sparkles  of  the  flame  of  battle.  For  the 
prompt  combativeness  of  the  strong  man,  which  had  rendered 
his  career  often  stormy  as  well  as  nearly  always  triumphant, 
and  which  age  had  only  slackened  not  extinguished,  made 
itself  seen  and  felt  in  the  first  passages  of  even  fragmentary 
talk.  But  again  and  again,  as  I  more  fully  learned  later,  his 
speech  could  soften  into  a  fine  restraint :  there  came  X  pla- 
cidly gentle  expression  into  the  eyes ;  and  the  veteran 
losopher's  manners  took  on  a  courtliness  which  bore  witn^ 
to  his  wide  social  experience. 

Before  the  interview  ended,  I  found  that  Sir  David  had 
bethought  himself  of  the  Human  Eye  as  a  likely  subject  for 


Lpia- 


BREWSTER  AND  IJERSCHEL,  4^7 

one  or  two  articles  for  Good  Words ;  and  it  was  to  mention 
this  that  he.  had  so  kindly  taken  the  trouble  to  climb  my  stair- 
case. He  promised  to  supply  the  first  paper  for  the  March 
number  of  the  magazine.  He  continued  for  some  little  time  to 
talk  upon  a  variety  of  subjects,  his  full  mind  seeming  easily 
to  well  over  into  fluent  conversation  on  any  matter  for  which 
the  slightest  of  cues  happened  to  offer.  As  I  listened  I  could 
not  help  thinking  that  the  speaker  carried  you  back  in  his 
career,  to  times  and  persons  that  supreme  celebrity  had  long 
since  made  historic.  The  venerable  man  before  me — he  was 
then  in  his  eighty-first  year, — had  talked  with  La  Place ;  he 
had  seen  Cuvier;  been  introduced  to  Lamarck.  But  though 
the  four-score  years  had  bent  his  shoulders  a  little,  and  worn 
the.figure  into  what  I  fear  must  be  called  gauntness,  drying 
his  visage  and  stamping  it  with  wrinkles,  he  was  arranging, 
with  ah  enthusiasm  not  unbefitting  youth,  for  fresh  papers  to 
appear  in  a  newly-started  cheap  popular  monthly  periodical. 
He  wrote  two  articles  on  the  Eye,  the  second  being  printed  in 
Good  Words  for  August,  1862.  The  precise  titles  were,  "The 
Eye :  Its  Structure  and  Powers ;  "  and  "  The  Human  Eye  *  Its 
Phenomena  and  Illusions."  It  is  nearly  superfluous  to  say  that 
the  papers  were  models  of  scientific  exposition,  giving  the 
exactest  information  in  the  easiest,  most  readable  style.  Any 
one  may  refer  to  them  to-day  with  pleasure  and  advantage. 

In  the  meantime  we  removed  our  business  from  Edinburgh 
to  London,  and  I  had  no  further  personal  intercourse  with 
Sir  David  in  Scotland.  But  I  had  not  been  very  long  settled 
in  my  new  quarters  before  he,  on  visiting  town,  again  looked 
in  upon  me.  Subsequently  I  had  the  favor  of  several  calls 
from  him  there ;  and  he  went  on  writing  for  the  magazine 
rHiring  1863,  he  contributed  two  papers ;  the  first  of  these, 
siMjublished  in  the  January  number,  being  on  **  The  Character- 
^Vics  of  the  Age."  It  was  full  of  pleasant  banter,  deriding 
d  try  skillfully  a  number  of  semi-scientific  crazes  just  then 
r      iaking  a  great  stir  in  London  and  other  places.     But  in  the 


t 


428       ^^    .'        THE. LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

issue  for  October,  he  took  in  hand  a  more  serious  topic,  one 
which  he  had  much  at  heart,  as  the  suggester  of  the  "  built- 
up  "  lens  for  use  in  lighthouses  was  likely  to  have,  viz.,  "The 
Life-boat  and  its  Work."  Once  again,  and  only  once,  did  Sir 
David  use  his  pen  for  Good  Words  in  a  paper  entitled  "  Life 
in  a  Drop  of  Water,"  published  in  February,  1864.  I  cannot 
resist  the  temptation  to  quote  the  concluding  paragraph  of 
the  article,  for  it  appeared  to  me  at  the  time,  and  does  so  still, 
to  be  a  good  specimen  of  Sir  David's  style  at  its  best,  and  very 
remarkable  indeed,  remembering  the  years  whigh  he  had 
reached  : — 

"  Whatever  difference  of  opinion  may  exist  respecting  the 
origin  of  animalcular  life,  there  is  but  one  opinion  about  its 
universal  diffusion.  In  the  lower  atmosphere  in  which  we 
live,  the  air  is  full  of  particles,  mineral  and  vegetable,  from 
Nubstances  injurious  to  health,  and  of  millions  of  animalcules 
?)orn  and  bred  in  putrid  marshes,  and  in  the  countless  charnel- 
houses  of  civilization.  Neither  power,  nor  wealth,  nor  science, 
can  purify  the  air  which  they  poison,  nor  strangle  the  scor- 
pions which  that  poison  breeds.  The  storm  that  changes  our 
aerial  food  may  leave  us  in  a  less  salubrious  atmosphere,  and 
the  zephyr  breath  even,  that  wafts  to  us  the  perfumes  of  sum- 
mer, may  mingle  with  them  the  malaria  through  which  they 
have  passed.  The  thunderbolt  from  above  may  precipitate  in 
meteorites  the  solid  particles  in  the  atmosphere  ;  but  the  as- 
cending lightning-stroke  again  carries  them  upward,  from  the 
metalliferous  rocks  around  us.  The  cunning  of  the  chemist 
cannot  throw  down  the  poison  that  twinkles  in  the  sunbeams, 
or  slay  the  vampires  that  swarm  under  our  roofs.  In  the 
meadows,  and  on  the  heath  or  the  river  sid  j,  and  on  the  gran- 
ite peaks,  in  the  day  and  in  the  night,  in  our  food  and  in  our 
drink,  we  cannot  escape  from  the  atoms  of  poison  which  we 
breathe,  and  the  legions  of  swarming,  crawling,  and  whirling 
life  which  are  ever  at  work  within  us,  and  without  us,  and  aroofid 
us.     The  epidemics  which  are  ever  filling  our  homes,  with 


BREWSTER  AND  HERSCHEL.  429 

mourning,  are  doubtless  the  slow  and  the  sudden  growth  of 
these  deleterious  visitants.  The  lance  and  the  leech  cannot 
cope  with  them ;  and  all  the  correctives  in  the  pharmacopoeia 
are  equally  powerless.  There  is  no  relief  but  in  resignation^ 
no  comfort  but  in  the  true  anodyne  of  life, — ^Thy  Will  be 
Do'NE." 

Sir  David's  long  life  did  not  reach  its  end  until  1869;  but 
his  age,  and  the  repeated  public  reports  of  weakening  health, 
made  it  impossible  to  urge  appeals  for  further  contributions. 
Again  and  again,  however,  expressions  of  his  continued  in- 
terest in  the  magazine  reached  the  office  indirectly.  Very 
gratefully  I  bear  testimony  to  the  punctuality  and  consider- 
ateness  in  every  way  which  he  showed  in  reference  to  his 
contributions.  If  any  writer  had  good  justification  for  asking 
postponement  or  for  causing  inconvenience  by  not  adhering 
to  understandings  as  to  amount  of  space,  it  surely  was  Sir 
David  Brewster,  at  his  time  of  life,  and  with  a  mind  surcharged 
on  what  he  was  writing.  But  he  was  just  the  one  who  made 
no  excuse,  required  no  indulgence.  Every  one  of  the  promises 
he  made  was  kept  to  the  moment,  fulfilled  to  the  letter.  I 
was  much  surprised  when  he  one  day,  in  reply  to  a  compli- 
mentary remark  on  this  score,  said,  "  It  costs  me  a  good  many 
pains  to  write  against  time."  But  I  learned  afterwards,  from 
those  who  had  opportunities  of  observing  his  working  habits, 
that  this  really  was  so,  and  that,  though  he  was  always  ready 
for  experimental  study,  he  had  a  tendency  to  put  off  any  piece 
of  writing  to  the  last  moment.  How  he  managed  to  combine 
precise  punctuality  with  that  impulse  I  cannot  tell,  but  I  know 
that  he  did  'succeed  in  doing  it.  His  manuscript  was  very 
legibly  penned,  and  in  revising  for  the  press  he  made  little 
alteration :  there  was  every  mark  of  great  care  being  taken 
with  the  original  composition.  On  the  last  occasion,  or  the 
last  but  one,  of  his  talking  with  me,  he  said, 

"  Go  on  giving  the  people  full,  true  information  about  the 
facts  of  the  world,  and  it  is  impossible  that  better  knowledge 


430  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

of  it  can  finally  .leave  men  ignorant  of  the  Maker  of  the 
world." 

I  bethought  myself  of  that  when  he  was  finally  laid  to  rest, 
full  alike  of  years  and  honors,  in  the  shadow  of  Melrose 
Abbey,  feeling  assured  that  even  his  learning  had  then  been 
added  to,  and  that  his  knowledge  had  at  last  become  perfect. 

But  so  far  I  have  confined  myself  to  one  of  the  two  names 
prefixed  to  this  paper.  During  these  years,  the  magazine  had 
another  scientific  contributor,  whose  fame  in  some  respects 
outshone  that  of  Brewster  himself.  Sir  John  Herschel,  the 
second — or,  if  we  reckon,  as  we  well  may  do,  his  aunt  Caro- 
line, the  third — of  the  family  dynasty,  the  inheritor  of  his 
father's  genius  as  well  as  his  honors,  could  not,  it  is  true, 
point  to  the  same  multiformity  of  popular  achievement  as  his 
great  northern  contemporary,  the  inventor  of  the  kaleido- 
scope, and  I  know  not  what  else,  but  his  wonderful  successes 
in  his  own  loftier,  stiller,  more  solemn  field,  and  an  unequaled 
brilliancy  of  literary  style,  caused  him  to  be  regarded  in  Eng- 
land in  those  days  as  the  very  sun  of  the  world  of  science, 
though  Faraday  and  Whewell  were  yet  above  the  horizon. 

I  have  already  mentioned  that  he  kindly  yielded  to  the 
appeal  Dr.  Macleod  made  to  him,  immediately  after  Good 
Words  started,  to  become  a  contributor  to  its  pages.  But  the 
carrying  out  of  this  welcome  promise  was  in  some  way  hin- 
dered month  after  month,  so  that  the  first  paper  from  his  pen 
did  not  actually  appear  until  just  a  year  after  Sir  David  Brew- 
ster's earliest  contribution.  The  precise  date  was  January, 
1863.  It  was  an  article  entitled  "  About  Volcanoes  and  Earth- 
quakes, "*  and  he  followed  it  up  with  a  second  essay  on  the 
same  subject  next  month.  In  the  first  of  these  papers  was 
given  a  most  lucid  exposition  of  the  causes  of  the  phenomena ; 
in  the  other  was  supplied  an  admirably  condensed  history  of 
the  more  notable  among  the  recorded  catastrophes.  A  few 
days  after  the  second  paper  appeared  in  print,  I  made  my  first 
personal  acquaintance  with  the  distinguished  writer  of  thenu 


BREWSTER  AND  HERSCHEL.  * \^  431 

It  was,  I  remember,  a  dull  afternoon  when  the  name  of  Sir 
John  Herschel  was  unexpectedly  announced  in  the  inner 
room  of  my  office.    I  hurried  forward  to  receive  him  with  all 
possible  respect,  and  my  first  sight  of  the  visitor  gave  me  a 
gentle,  not  unpleasant,  but  still  a  distinct  shock  of  surprise. 
I  saw  standing  in  the  dimly-lighted  doorway,  as  it  might  be  in 
the  frame  of  a  picture,  a  small,  finely-shaped  old  man,  wearing 
on  his  head  a  black  velvet  skull-cap,  from  beneath  which  fell, 
in  a  loose  straggling  way,  long  locks  of  snow-white  hair.    His 
face,  which  had  the  placid  worn  look  of  age,  was  made  very 
striking  by  large  lustrous  eyes,  above  which  the  expansive 
brow  rose  deeply  furrowed  by  countless  wrinkles.    It  was  like 
receiving  a  guest  from  another  time,  one  who  brought  with 
him  the  atmosphere  of  past  generations.    Indeed,  if  I  must 
quite  convey  the  impression  I  got  during  the  first  seconds  of 
his  unlooked-for  presence,  I  think  I  must  say  that  I  was  rather 
reminded  of  one  of  the  ancient  alchemists  than  of  our-modern 
men  of  science.     But  very  quickly  this  sense  of  a  picturesque 
unusualness  of  dress  and  appearance  merged  into  an  apprecia- 
tion of  a  strict  fitness  in  it  all.     Sir  John  Herschel's  bearing, 
even  under  his  weight  of  years,  was  grace  itself,  and  the  most 
ordinary  remarks  falling  from  his  lips  had  a  certain  polish  of 
diction.    A  little  foreignness  of  aspect  and  manner  seemed  to 
me  to  cling  to  him  throughout,  but  our  interview  had  not 
advanced  very  far  before  I  mentally  put  away  my  first  thought 
of  the  alchemist,  and  was  quite  ready  to  substitute  for  it  the 
notion  of  one  of  the  old  scholarly  Venetian  nobles. 

"  I  was  passing,"  he  kindly  explained,  "  and  I  felt  that  I 
must  call  and  thank  you."  (Some  little  act  of  service  had 
l>een  done  him ;  if  I  recollect  rightly  the  sending  of  copies  of 
tlie  magazine  to  friends  of  his  whose  names  he  had  supplied.) 
"  But,  besides  that,  I  wanted  to  say  to  you,  as  well  as  to  Dr. 
Macleod,  how  glad  I  am  to  find  myself  in  such  good  company 
in  your  pages." 

He  went  on  to  speak  in  words  of  high  praise  of  several 


432  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

well-known  contributors,  who  happened  to  be  among  the 
writers  in  the  last  number  of  the  magazine.  I  had  to  submit 
to  a  keen,  though  very  courteously-conducted  cross-examina- 
tion as  to  the  position  of  the  periodical,  its  early  obstacles, 
and  pur  means  and  modes  of  distributing  it.  Some  of  Sir 
John's  remarks  on  particular  articles  which  had  appeared  in 
Good  Words,  ranging  from  the  very  beginning  of  it,  showed 
that  his  saying  that  he  had  watched  its  progress  with  interest 
was  not  a  compliment  merely. 

"  I  am  not  a  very  young  man,"  he  finally  said,  shaking  his 
head  with  a  sad  smile,  "  and  I  must  not  make  large  promises ; 
but  1  have  planned  several  papers,  if  I  am  spared  to  write 
them.    You  may  depend  upon  my  doing  what  I  can." 

The  expectations  thus  raised  were  not  disappointed,  for  he 
contributed  to  the  April  issue  of  Gk>od  Words  a  magnificent 
paper  on  "  The  Sun."  It  was  the  proper  theme  for  the  man 
who  had  once  said,  "  My  first  love  was  Light,"  and  he  made 
its  treatment  worthy  of  it  and  of  himself.  He  summarized 
the  recent  discoveries  as  to  the  great  orb  down  to  the  very 
latest  announcement,  evidently  rejoicing  in  the  advances 
which  younger  men  were  making  on  the  splendid  investiga- 
tions of  his  father  and  himself.  During  the  same  year  (1863), 
Sir  John  Herschel  furnished  two  more  papers,-  both  dealing 
with  the  subject  of  "  Comets."  Every  one  of  his  contribu- 
tions showed  his  special  power  of  bringing  recondite  knowl- 
edge down  to  the  level  of  the  common  understanding ;  and. 
at  the  same  time,  his  no  less  unfailing  characteristic  of  mixing 
lofty  speculation  with  the  most  laboriously-minute  expounding. 

A  striking  instance  of  this  occurs  to  me  as  I  write.  On  his 
returning  the  proof  of  the  second  article  on  "  Comets,"  it  was 
found  that  he  had  added  a  footnote  containing  ahint  which, 
if  worked  out  into  all  its  details,  must  of  necessity  greatly 
modify  the  fundamental  conception  of  the  physical  universe. 
In  the  body  of  the  paper  he  had  occasion  to  speak  of  ,two^ 
kinds  of  matter,  one  of  which  he  styles  "  levitating/'  asopposedl 


t 


BREWSTER  AND  HERSCHEL,        _^  '  433 

to  ^*  gravitating."  The  npte  goes  on  to  say, "  But  the  existence 
of  a  rej)ulsive  force,  somehow  operated,  remains  unco'itro- 
verted.  .  .  .  All  this  supposes  a  real  existence  of  "  electricity  " 
as  a  things  an  entity  having  forces  but  devoid  of  inertia^  which 
ideas  if  we  once  consent  to  detach  from  each  other,  we  are 
landed  in  a  new  region  of  metaphysical  as  well  as  dynamical 
speculation,  and  may  be  led  to  conceive  the  possible  exist- 
ence of  a  transferable  cause  of  force  distinct  alike  from  force 
and  from  matter."  (The  italics  are  Sir  John  Herschel's  own.) 
In  times  when  "  force  "  is  a  term  so  largely  used,  it  may  be 
worth  while  recalling  that  this  experienced  philosopher  had  a 
glimpse  of  a  conception  more  ultimate  still,  and  which  he 
believed  he  could  apply  in  the  explanation  of  physical  phe- 
nomena. His  lofty  imagination  always  shot  new  light  through 
the  topic  he  was  handling.  Whether  he  is  speaking  of  the 
distance  and  velocity  of  magnificent  Sirius  or  of  the  measure- 
ment of  "  the  standard  British  inch,"  he  plays  with  the  theme 
in  a  way  which  alternately  makes  the  large  small  and  the 
small  large. 

In  this  last  remark  I  have  unawares  anticipated  mention  of 
Sir  John's  fi??al  contributicjp  to  Good  Words ;  it  was  a  paper 
with  the  title  "Celestial  Measurings  and  Weighings,"  and 
appeared  in  June,  1864.  The  thoughtful  reader  will  thank  me 
for  quoting  a  fine  imaginative  passage,  in  which  the  veteran 
astronomer  may  be  thought  to  sum  up,  with  his  owi>  eloquence, 
his  life-long  telescopic  searchings  of  the  heavens  : — 

"Practically  speaking,  the  material  universe  must  be  re- 
garded as  infinite,  seeing  that  we  can  perceive  no  reason 
which  can  place  any  bounds  to  the  farther  extension  of  that 
principle  of  systematic  subordination  which  we  have  traced 
to  a  certain  extent,  and  which  combines  in  its  fullest  concep- 
tion a  unity  of  plan  and  a  singleness  of  result  with  an  unlim- 
ited multiplicity  of  subordinated  individuals,  groups,  systems, 
and  families  of  systems.  Thus  it  by  no  means  follows  that  all 
those  objects  which  stand  classed  under  the  general  designa- 


434  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

tion  of  *  nebulae '  or  clusters  of  stars,  and  of  which  the  num- 
ber already  known  amounts  to  upwards  of  five  thousand,  are 
objects  (looked  upon  from  this  point  of  view)  of  the  same 
order.  Among  those  dim  and  mysterious  existences,  w^hich 
only  a  practiced  eye,  aided  by  a  powerful  telescope,  can  pro- 
nounce to  be  something  different  from  minute  stars,  may,  for 
anything  we  can  prove  to  the  contrary,  he  included  systems 
of  a  higher  order  than  that  which  comprehends  all  our  nebulae 
properly  such)  reduced  by  immensity  of  distance  to  the  very 
last  limit  of  visibility.  And  this  conceptions^ we  may  remark, 
affords  something  like  a  reasonable  answer  to  those  who 
have  assumed  an  imperfect  transparency  oi  the  celestial  spaces 
on  the  ground  that,  but  for  some  such  cause,  the  whole  celes- 
tial vault  ought  to  blaze  with  solar  splendor,  seeing  that  in  no 
direction  of  the  visual  ray,  if  continued  far  enough,  would  it 
fail  to  meet  with  a  star.  .  .  . 

"  Such  a  speculation  as  this  just  mentioned  may  possibly 
appear  irrelevant.  But  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  is 
LIGHT,  and  the  free  communication  of  it  from  the  remotest 
regions  of  the  uniyerse,  which  alone  can  give,  and  does  fully 
give  us,  the  assurance  of  a  uniform  and  all-pervading  energy 
— a  mechanism  almost  beyond  conception^  at  once  complex, 
minute,  and  powerful,  by  which  that  influence,  or  rather  that 
movement,  is  propagated.  Our  evidence  for  the  existence  of 
gravitation  fails  us  beyond  the  region  of  the  double  stars,  or 
leaves  us  at  best  only  a  presumption  amounting  to  conviction 
in  its  favor.  But  the  argument  for  a  unity  of  design  and 
action  afforded  by  light  stands  unweakened  by  distance,  and 
is 'co-extensive  with  the  universe  itself." 

1  wish  that  I  was  able  to  recall  more  fully  than  I  am  Sir  John 
Herschel's  conversation  at  the  interviews  with  which  he  from 
time  to  time  favored  me.  During  one  of  the  talks,  some 
allusion  was  made  to  Africa,  and  a  fair  opening  arose  for 
mentioning  his  famous  labors  at  the  Cape.  It  was  surprising 
to  see  the  quicl^  enthusiasm  with  which  his  mind  carried  him 


BRE  WSTER  AND  HERSCHEL,  43 5 

back  to  the  southern  hemisphere,  whose  glittering  constella- 
tions he  was  the  first  learnedly  to  track.  On  several  occa- 
sions, he  spoke  of  the  supposed  opposition  between  science 
and  religion,  and  always  repudiated  the  notion.  I  remember 
he  firmly  insisted  that  in  the  end  theology  would  gain  by 
successful  physical  investigation,  making  our  knowledge  of 
the  Deity's  operations  more  definite.  This  prospect  of  intel- 
lectual advancement  seemed  to  him  to  promise  spiritual  pro- 
gress. Anjrthing  that  theology  lost,  he  said,  would  be  simply 
non-essentials,  founded  on  mistake,  arising  from  ignorance, 
and  really  hurtful  to  spiritual  life,  not  helpful  to  it.  One  of 
his  remarks  was  this, — "  Science  will  teach  man  how  God  deals 
with  him  physically  in  this  world,  and,  as  he  learns  both  the  - 
wisdom  and  the  love  of  the  methodOjf^such  dealing,  man  can- 
not but  know  and  love  his  Maker  and'Ruler  better."  Through- 
out, his  speech  on  these  matters  was,  as  all  acquainted  with 
his  writings  would  expect,  that  of  the  older  generations  of 
philosophical  thinkers,  Brewster,  Faraday,  Whewell,  whose 
knowledge  most  assuredly  added  to  their  faith,  not  detracted 
from  it. 

I  had  the  privilege  ct  seeing  Sir  John  Herschel  two  or  three 
times  after  the  appearance  of  his  latest  paper,  and  on  each 
occasion  his  unwearied  mind  was  pr(/mptly  willing  to  project 
fresh  contributions  to  the  magazi  ne.  But  it  was  too  much  to 
hope  for.  I,  indeed,  now  a  little  wonder  at  the  courage 
required  for  the  application  alike  to  him  and  to  Sir  David 
Brewster  to  take  up  their  pens  at  their  time  of  life.  The  spec- 
tacle of  these  two  patriarchs  of  science,  one  turned  eighty 
years  of  age,  and  the  other  not  very  much  younger,  writing 
side  by  side  in  the  pages  of  a  sixpenny  magazine,  with  no 
other  motive  than  the  wish  to  increase  knowledge  among  the 
people,  seems  to  me  even  more  impressive  looked  back  upon 
now  than  it  did  then.  Not  a  little  of  the  credit  of  the  modern 
popularization  of  physical  science  is  fairly  due  to  these  two 
great  men.       ^ 


43^       ^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

I  always  remember  them  together,  for  when  in  personal 
communication  with  either  of  them,  I  was  in  some  way  made 
to  think  of  the  other.  In  appearance,  in  manner,  and  in  the 
modes  of  their  relation  to  the  public,  they  were  very  different ; 
you  might  almost  term  them  contrasts.  One  was  combatant, 
ready  always  to  champion  science  in  front  of  the  world,  the 
founder  of  a  "  British  Association  "  for  its  promotion ;  the 
other,  though  the  most  widely-traveled  savant  of  his  time,  was 
elegant,  preferring  quiet,  working  in  privacy.  But  on  one 
point  they  were  alike,  and  the  palm  must  be  equally  divided 
between  them, — ^that  is,  their  eager  desire  to  scatter  wide 
among  the  multitude  the  knowledge  which  they  so  laboriously 
won. 

It  is  a  lasting  gratification  to  have  been,  owing  to  the  acci- 
dents of  one's  own  career,  a  little  helpful  to  them  in  their 
great  task. 

Alexander  Strahan,  in  The  Day  of  Rest. 


CHARLES  DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR. 

The  figure  of  the  amiable,  accomplished,  and  ever-to-be- 
regretted  Charles  Dickens  has  been  brought  before  us  "  even 
in  his  habit  as  he  lived,"  with  abundance  of  detail  and  color. 
Mr.  Forster's  complete  and  admirable  biograj>hy,  done  with 
the  taste  and  workmanlike  finish  of  a  true  "  man  of  letters," 
will  be  more  and  more  esteemed  as  the  time  from  hi§  death 
lengthens.  Objection  was  indeed  taken  to  the  biographer 
accompanying  his  hero  about  as  closely  as  Bos  well  did  John- 
son ;  but  this  really  brought  before  the  world  much  that  would 
otherwise  have  been  lost  or  unseen;. and  in  the  last  volume^ 
where  the  author  seems  to  have  accepted  this  criticism  and  to 
have  become  historical,  there  is  a  sensible  loss  of  dramatic 
-nvidness.    Lately  the  world  has  received  the  closing  c(4^0i 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR,  "  437 

tion  of  hisietters,  edited  by  Miss  Hogarth  and  Miss  Dickens, 
and  set  off  with  a  graphic  and  most  pleasing  commentary 
whose  only  fault  is  that  of  being  too  short.  Here  his  gaiete 
de  coeur,  his  unflagging  spirit,  wit,  and  genial  temper,  are 
revealed  in  the  most  striking  way. 

There  is,  however,  one  view  of  him  which  has  scarcely  been  . 
sufficiently  dealt  with — namely,  his  relations  with  his  literary 
brethren  and  friends,  as  editor  and  otherwise.  These  exhibit 
him  in  a  most  engaging  light,  and  will  perhaps  be  a  surprise 
even  to  those  abundantly  familiar  with  his  amiable  and  gra- 
cious ways. 

In  the  old  Household  Words  days,  the  "  place  of  business  " 
was  at  a  charming  little  miniature  office  in  Wellington  Street — 
close  to  the  stage  door  of  the  (xaiety  Theater.  It  seemed  all 
bow  window;  at  least,  its  two  stories — it  had  only  two — ^were 
thus  bowed.  The  drawing-room  floor  seemed  a  sunshiny, 
cheerful  place  to  work  in.  This  is  now  the  workshop  of 
another  magazine,  the  Army  and  Navy.  But  I  always  pass  it 
with  respect  and  affection.  I  never  came  away  from  it  with- 
out taking  with  me  something  pleasing. 

Often,  about  eleven  o'clock,  he  was  to  be  seen  tramping 
briskly  along  the  Strand,  coming  from  Charing  Cross  station, 
fresh  ifrom  his  pleasant  country  place  in  Kent,  keen  and  ready 
for  the  day's  work,  and  carrying  his  little  black  bag  full  of 
proofs  and  MS.  That  daily  journey  from  Higham  station, 
with  the  drive  to  it  in  his  little  carriage  or  wisk  car,  took  full 
an  hour  each  way,  and  was  a  serious  slice  out  of  his  time. 

It  is  always  a  problem  to  me  why  business  men,  to  whom 
moments  are  precious,  should  be  thus  prodigal  in  time  devoted 
to  traveling — coming  from  Brighton  and  returning  at  head- 
long speed.  At  Bedford  Street,  by  the  bootmaker's  shop,  he 
would  turn  out  of  the  Strand — ^those  in  the  shops  he  passed 
-would  know  his  figure  well,  and  told  me  after  his  death  how 
they  missed  this  familiar  apparition — ^and  would  then  post 
along,  in  the  same  brisk  stride  through  Maiden  Lane,  past 


43^  THE  LIBR4Ry  MAGAZINE, 

"  Rule's,"  where  he  often  had  his  oyster,  through  Tavistock 
Street,  till  he  emerged  in  Wellington  Street,  the  last  house  he 
passed  before  crossing  being  "Major  Pitt's,"  the  hatter's. 
This  mention  of  "  Major  Pitt "  suggests  that  it  was  always- 
pleasant  to  see  what  pride  the  tradesmen  took  in  having  him 
for  a  customer,  and  what  alacrity  they  put  to  his  service,  or  to 
Qblige  him  in  any  way.  This  I  believe  was  really  owing  to  his 
charming  hearty  manner,  ever  courteous,  cordial,  and  zealous ; 
his  cheery  fashion  of  joking  or  jest,  which  was  irresistible. 
The  average  tradesman  has  small  sympathy  or  intelligence 
for  the  regular  literary  man.  It  is  sometimes  caviare,  indeed, 
to  them. 

Our  writer,  however,  was  a  serious  personality  of  living 
flesh  and  bl6od,  and  would  have  made  his  "way  in  life  under 
any  condition.  His  extraordinary  charm  of  manner,  never 
capriciously  changed,  the  smile  and  laugh  always  ready — the 
sympathy,  too,  that  rises  before  me,  and  was  really  unique — I 
can  call  no  one  to  mind  that  possessed  or  possesses  it  now  in 
the  same  degree.  Literary  men,  as  a  rule,  have  a  chilliness  as 
regards  their  brethren  ;  everyone  is  more  or  less  working'for 
his  own  hand.  Yet,  few  men  had  more  anxious  responsibili- 
ties or  troubles  to  disturb  them,  or  so  much  depending  upon 
them  as  he  had  in  many  ways.  I  believe  the  number  of  people 
who  were  always  wanting  '*  something  done  for  them,"  either 
in  the  shape  of  actual  money  advances,  or  advice,  or  produc- 
tions "  to  be  taken,"  or  to  be  seen,  or  to  have  their  letters 
answered,  or  who  desired  letters  from  him  in  their  interests, 
was  perfectly  incredible.  Many  a  man  takes  refuge  in  a  com- 
plete ignoring  of  these  worries,  which  would  require  a  life  to 
attend  to.  An  eminent  and  highly  popular  man  of  our  own 
day,  who  is  thus  persecuted,  has  adopted  this  latter  mode,  and 
rarely  takes  notice  of  a  letter  from  a  friend  or  stranger,  unless 
he  is  so  minded  to  do.  He  is  strictly  in  his  right.  You  are 
no  more  bound  to  reply  to  persons  that  do  not  know  you,  than 
you  are  to  acknowledge  the  attentions  of  an  organ-grinder 
—ho  plays  for  an  hour  before  your  window. 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR* S  CHAIR.  439 

Another  little  Household  Words  tradition  was  this :  The 
"chief"  himself  always  wrote  with  blue  ink  on  blue  paper. 
His  was  a  singularly  neat  and  regular  hand,  really  artistic  in 
its  conception,  legible,  yet  not  very  legible  to  those  unfamiliar 
with  it.  Here,  as  in  everything  else,  was  to  be  noted  the 
perfect  finish,  as  it  might  be  styled,  of  his  letter-writing — the 
disposition  of  the  paragraphs,  even  the  stopping,  the  use  of 
capitals,  all  showing  artistic  knowledge,  and  conveying  ex- 
cellent and  valuable  lessons.  His  "  copy  "  for  the  printers, 
written  as  it  is  in  very  small  hand,  much  crowded,  is  trying 
enough  to  the  eyes,  but  the  printers  never  found  any  diffi- 
culties. It  was  much  and  carefully  corrected,  and  wherever 
there  was  an  erasure,  it  was  done  in  thorough  fashion,  so  that 
what  was  effaced  could  not  be  read.  Nearly  all  the  band 
followed  his  example  in  writing  in  blue  ink  and  on  blue  paper, 
and  this  for  many  years;  but  not  without  inconvenience. 
For,  like  the  boy  and  his  button  described  by  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  the  absence  of  paper  or  ink  of  the  necessary  color  af- 
fected the  ideas,  and  one  worked  under  serious  disabilities, 
strangeness,  etc.  Another  idiosyncrasy  of  his  was  writing  the 
day  of  the  month  in  full,  as  "January  twenty-sixth.'* 

It  is  in  his  relations  with  writers  in  his  periodical,  and,  in- 
deed, in  all  connections  with  his  "  literary  brethren,"  as  he 
modestly  called  them,  that  this  amiable  and  engaging  man 
appears  to  the  most  extraordinary  advantage.  As  I  read  over 
his  many  letters  on  those  points,  I  am  amazed  at  the  good- 
natured  allowance,^  the  untiring  good  humor,  the  wish  to 
please  and  make  pleasant,  the  almost  deference,  the  modesty 
in  one  of  his  great  position  as  head,  perhaps,  of  all  living 
writers — ^to  say  nothing  of  his  position  as  director  of  the 
periodical  which  he  kindled  with  his  own  perpetual  inspira- 
tions. There  was  ever  the  same  uniform  good  nature  and 
ardor,  the  eagerness  to  welcome  and  second  any  plan,  a  re- 
luctance to  dismiss  it,  and  this  done  with  apologies  ;  all,  too, 
in  the  strangest  contrast  to  the  summary  and  plain-spoken 


440  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

fashion  of  the  ordinary  editor.  I  fancy  this  view  has  scarcely 
been  sufficiently  brought  out  in  all  the  numerous  estimates 
of  this  most  charming  of  men.  And,  at  the  risk  of  some  in- 
trusion of  my  own  concerns,  I  shall  be  enabled  to  show  him 
in  even  a  more  engaging  and  attractive  Tight.  The  various 
accounts  have  scarcely  been  concerned  with  this  side  of  his 
character. 

This  patient  interest  should,  in  these  editorial  matters,  be- 
come more  wonderful  when  it  is  considered  that  his  position 
as  head  of  an  important  periodical  made  him  a  marked  figure 
for  importunity.  Many  of  his  friends  were  tempted  to  become 
*"  1  iterary."  They  even  had  their  friends  who  desired  to  become 
liteniry,  and  under  pressure  would  introduce  to  this  great 
writer  immature  and  unprofitable  efforts  which  he  had  to  put 
aside  with  what  excuses  he  could.  Then  there  were  his 
"  literary  brethren,"  each  with  his  "  novel "  or  short  paper, 
which  it  would  occur  to  him  some  morning  "  he  would  send 
off  to  Dickens."  These  had  to  be  considered,  and  his  good 
nature  or  courtesy  drawn  upon.  As  for  the  general  herd  of 
scribblers,  the  postman  on  "  this  beat  "  could  give  due  account 
of  the  packages  of  MS.  that  daily  arrived.  It  was  no  wonder 
that  he  had  to  compose  a  sort  of  special  circular  answer, 
whicli  was  duly  lithographed  and  returned  with  their  pro- 
ductions to  the  various  candidates.  I  believe  every  com- 
position was  seriously  glanced  at,  and  some  estimate  made — 
and  many  an  obscure  clever  girl  was  surprised  to  find  her 
efforts  appreciated.  The  usual  rejection-form  was  as  fol- 
lows : — 

SiTt— 1  ^"^  requested  by  Mr.  Charles  Dickens  to  express  his  regret  that  he  cannot 
ACCl^pt  the  contribution  you  have  had  the  goodness  to  offer  him  for  insertion  in  this  peri- 
od leaJ,  bo  many  manuscripts  are  forwarded  to  this  office,  that  Mr.  Dickens  trusts  it  is 
Ciuly  necessary  to.suggest  to  you  the  impossibility  of  its  business  being  transacted,  if  a 
speeEa!  tetter  of  explanation  were  addressed  to  every  correspondent  whose  proffered 
wiJ  IS  deetiiiedt  But  he  wishes  me  to  convey  to  you  the  assurance, — firstly,  that  yo"^ 
favnt  hoi  beet!  honestly  read,  and  secondly,  that  it  is  always  no  less  a  pleasure  to  mlftto 
tha»  jt  Ls  htis  interest  to  avail  himself  of  any  contributions  that  are,  in  his  judgment,  ^^ 
suU&d  to  the  requirements  of  Household  Words.  ^ 

The  band  of  writers  he  assembled  round  him  and  inspired       x 


\ 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR,  441 

was  certainly  remarkable.  There  was  Hollingshead,  incisive, 
wonderful  in  collecting  facts  where  abuses  were  concerned, 
and  putting  his  facts  into  vigorous  downright  English.  Hi* 
strokes  always  told,  and  a  little  paper  of  his,  conceived  in  this 
spirit,  entitled  "  Give  us  More  Room,"  a  simple  subject,  was 
copied  at  length  into  the  Times,  and  from  the  Times  into  othei 
papers.  There  was  Moy  Thomas,  now  the  pleasant  writer  o: 
the  Monday  "  Causeries  "  in  the  Daily  News.  There  was  Wal* 
ter  Thornbury,  with  his  extraordinary  knowledge  of  London 
antiquities  and  curious  "  out-of-the-way  "  reading,  an  explorer 
of  old  "  wynds  "  and  alleys,  from  "  Bookseller's  Row  "  to  Red 
Lion  Square ;  very  dainty  in  his  taste,  as  his  quaint  bookplates, 
designed  for  him  by  Mr.  Marks,  show.  He  had  great  anti- 
quarian knowledge,  and  yet,  odd  to  say,  a  facile  dramatic  and 
unantiquarian  style.  There  was  also  the  amiable  Charles  Cc!^ 
lins — our  '*  Conductor's  "  son-in-law — a  man  of  a  quiet,  pleas- 
ant humor  with  a  flavor  of  his  own,  and  heartily  liked  by  his 
friends.  He  had  a  remarkably  sweet  disposition,  though 
sorely  tried  by  perpetual  ill  health.  His  humor  was  stimulated 
by  the  companionship  of  his  father-in-law,  and  took  somewhat 
the  same  cast.  For  instance,  when  he  was  appointed,  during 
one  of  the  great  exhibitions,  to  the  odd  function — but  that  era 
of  exhibitions  engendered  all  sorts  of  fantastic  things — of 
making  a  collection  of  all  the  existing  newspapers  of  the 
kingdom,  the  oddities  that  cropped  up  during  this  duty  tickled 
his  fancy  and  that  of  his  friends  hugely.  He  noted  that  the 
smaller  and  more  obscure  the  place,  the  grander  and  more 
commanding  was  the  title  of  its  organ — witness,  The  Skib- 
bereen  Eagle,  a  name  that  gave  him  much  delight.  Writing 
he  delighted  in,  but,  by  a  cruel  fate,  it  was  a  labor,  if  of  love 
yet  accompanied  by  something  like  torture.  Every  idea  or 
sentence  was  wrung  from  him  as  he  said,  like  drops  of  blood. 
Neither  ideas  nor  words  would  flow.  His  "Cruise  upon 
\  Wheels,"  a  record  of  a  journey  along  the  French  roads  in  a 
gig>  is  a  most  charming  travel-book,  in  which  his  quaint  humor 


t 


'442  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

is  well  shown.  The  late  Andrew  Halliday  was  another  useful 
writer  that  could  be  depended  on  to  gather  hard  facts,  and  set 
them  out  when  gathered  in  vivacious  style.  He  enjoyed  a 
fixed  substantial  salary — ^think  of  that,  ye  occasional  "con* 
tributors  " — and  I  have  seen  him  arrive  in  his  hansom  with  his 
formal  list  of  "  subjects  "  for  treatment,  which  were  carefully 
gone  through,  debated,  ahd  selected.  He  afterwards  made 
play-writing  his  regular  vocation,  but  was  cut  off  in  his  prime* 
like  many  a  writer.  There  was  Parkinson  and  there  was  Pro*, 
fessor  Morley ;  above  al],  there  was  the  always  brilliant  George 
Augustus  Sala,  perhaps  the  only  writer  in  periodicals  who 
writes  a  distinctly  original  style,  with  personality  and  unflag- 
ging vivacity.  I  have  not  space  to  dwell  on  his  merits  hercv 
but  I  may  at  least  confess  to  looking  with  a  sort  of  wistful 
envy  at  his  exquisite  penmanship,  that  seems  never  to  depar*. 
from  one  steady  standard  of  excellence.  The  surprising  neat- 
ness and  clear  picturesqueness  of  his  calligraphy  is  the  delight; 
of  compositors,  as  with  humiliation  I  have  to  confess  that 
mine  is  their  despair.  Indeed,  I  may  make  a  clean  breast  pf  it 
and  further  own  that  on  one  journal  of  enormous  circulation 
the  men  demanded,  and  obtained,  extra  pay  "for  setting  Mr. 

's  copy.**    As  I  write,  the  old  Household  Words — a  title 

infinitely  superior  to  All  the  Year  Round — is  revived  by  the 
old  editor's  son,  a  capable,  energetic,  and  clever  man,  who  has 
pushed  his  way  with  success.  One  of  the  old  guild  thus 
writes  of  the  new  venture  in  the  Daily  News : — 

One  function  of  the  original  Household  Words,  as  of  its  legitimate  successor,  AH 
the  Year  Round,  has  proved  to  be  that  of  ushering  in  new  claimants  to  a  place  in  the 
world  of  literature  and  journalism.  The  great  position  enjoyed  by  Dickens  in  the 
literary  world,  his  early  and  intimate  connection  with  newspaper  work  as  a  man  **  in 
the  gallery,"  and  his  genial  and  helpful  nature,  attracted  a  crowd  of  aspirants  around 
him.  He  was  immeasurably  more  infested  than  ever  was  Pope  by  *'  frantic  poetess  ** 
and  "  rhyming  peer,"  and  the  "parson  much  bemused  with  beer"  was  assuredly  not 
wanting.  Out  of  this  crowd  of  claimants  he  chose  his  "  young  men  "  with  the  sldll  of 
a  born  leader,  and  helped  them  on  by  tongue  and  pen,  by  shrewd  counsel,  and  fierce 
*'  cutting  "  of  their  articles.  If  he  had  any  fault,  it  was  in  the  good  nature  which  p^;^ 
vented  him  from  crushing  unhappy  creatures,  doubtless  well  fitted  for  every  pureuK^ 
but  that  of  letters ;  and  who  were  induced  to  persevere  by  his  mistaken  kindness,  to 
'heir  own  ultimate  sorrow  and  discomfiture.    Some  had  written  much  or  kittle  before 


i 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  C^AIR:  443 

tkey  came  to  him,  but  the  fact  remains  that  it  was  under  his  leadership  that  they 
achieved  reputation.  Beneath  the  banner  upheld  by  Charles  Dickens  and  his  faithful 
friend,  th^  late  Mr.  W.  H.  Wills,  marched  a  brilliant  array  of  writers,  if  not  quite  of 
the  Titanic  proportions  of  the  early  contributors  to  Fraser's  Magazine,  yet  noteworthy 
by  their  brilliant  success  in  the  new  periodical.  Mr.  Wilkie  Collins  had  previously 
written  fiction,  but  his  most  famous  work,  "  The  Woman  in  White,"  appeared  in 
H  >usehold  Words.  The  late  Mr.  Qharles  Collins  was  actually  egged  on  by  "  the 
Chief  "  into  writing  hb  remarkable  ^^  Eye  Witness,"  and  other  papers.  Mr.  Sala's 
**  Key  of  the  Street '*  unlocked  "for  him  the  avenue  to  his  successful  career;  and  Mr. 
Grenville  Murray  spreads  his  wings  as  "  The  Roving  Englishman,"  and  made  his 
mark  by  a  Aerce  attack  on  the  late  Lord  Stratford  de  Redcliffe,  whom  he  satirized  as 
**  Sir  Hector  Stubble."  Mr.  Edmund  Yates's  best  novel, "  Black  Sheep,''  and  scores 
of  his  best  articles,  appeared  in  the  journal  "  conducted  by  Charles  Dickens,"  as  did 
Lord  Lytton's  '*  Strange  Story  ;  "  as  well  as  "  Hard  Times,"  '*  Great  Expectations," 
the  "  Uncommercial  Traveler,"  and  a  regiment  of  Christmas  stories  by  the  hand  of 
the  master  himself.  Among  the  writers  of  poems  and  stories,  short  and  long,  essays 
and  descriptions,  are  the  well-known  names  of  Harriet  Martineau,  Mrs.  Gaskell,  Peter 
C/unningham,  Miss  Jewsbury,  John  Forster,  Albert  Smith,  James  Hannay,  and  Mark 
Lemon. 

The  time  when  "  the  Christmas  Number "  had  to  be  got 
ready  was  always  one  of  pleasant  expectancy  and  alacrity.  It 
was  an  object  for  all  to  have  a  seat  in  a  "  vehicle  "  which 
traveled  every  road  and  reached  the  houses  of  a  quarter  of  a 
million  persons.  With  his  usual  conscientious  feeling  of  duty 
to  the  public,  he  labored  hard,  first,  to  secure  a  good  and  telling 
idea ;  and  second,  to  work  it  out  on  the  small  but  effective 
scale  with  which  he  had  latterly  grown  unfamiliar,  owing  to  his 
habit  of  dealing  with  large  canvases.  Hence  the  labor  was  in 
proportion,  and  at  last  became  so  irksome  that  he  gave  the 
place  up  altogether,  though  it  must  have  been  a  serious  loss 
of  profit.  Frappez  vite  et  frappez  fort,  was  the  system.  I 
remember  his  sajang,  when  complaining  of  this  tax,  "  I  have 
really  put  as  much  into  Mrs.  Lirriper  as  would  almost  make  a 
novel."  He  himself  generally  supplied  a  framework  and  a 
couple  of  short  stories,  and  the  rest  was  filled  in  by  "other 
hands."     I  have  myself  furnished  two  in  a  single  number. 

As  the  time  drew  near,  a  pleasantly  welcome  circular  went 
forth  to  a  few  of  the  writers  of  the  journal ;  the  paragraphs 
of  which,  as  they  exhibit  his  lighter  touches,  will  be  welcome. 
They  show,  too,  the  matter-of-fact,  business-like  style  in  which 
the  matter  was  conceived  and  carried  out. 


444-  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

In  inviting  you  to  contribute  to  our  Christmas  Number,  I  beg  to  send  you  JAx, 
Dickens's  memorandum  of  the  range  that  may  be  taken  thb  year.  You  will  see  that 
it  is  a  wide  one.  , 

The  slight  leading  notion  of  the  Number  being  devised  with  a  view  to  placing  as 
little  restriction  as  possible  on  the  fancies  of  my  fellow-writers  in  it,  there  is  again  no 
limitation  as  to  scene  or  first  person  or  third  person  ;  nor  is  any  reference  to  the  season 
of  the  year  essential. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  tales  are  not  supposed  to  be  narrated  to  any  audience, 
but  are  supposed  to  be  in  writing.  How  they  come  to  be  in  writing  requires  no  ac- 
counting for  whatever.  Nothing  to  which  they  refer  can  have  happened  within 
seven  years.  If  any  contribution  should  be  of  a  kind  that  would  derive  any  force  or 
playfulness,  or  suggestiveness  of  any  sort,  from  the  pretense  that  it  is  incomplete — 
that  the  beginning  is  not  there,  or  the  end,  or  the  middle,  or  any  other  portion — the 
pretense  will  be  quite  consistent  with  the  general  idea  of  the  Number. 

On  another  anniversary  the  circular  ran  : — 

Your  tale  may  be  narrated  cither  in  the  first  or  in  the  third  person — may  be  serious  Or 
droll — may  be  told  by  an  individual  of  either  sex,  and  of  any  station.  It  is  not  es- 
sential to  lay  the  scene  of  action  in  England  (tho'  the  tale  is  told  in  England),  and  no 
reference  whatever  to  Christmas  is  desired. 

The  tale  is  supposed  to  be  related  by  wqrd  of  mouth  to  a  man  who  has  retired  Trom 
the  world  and  shut  himself  tip  moodily,  gloomily,  and  dirtily.  Generally  it  should 
have  some  latent  bearing^y  implication  on  the  absurdity  of  such  a  proceeding — on  the 
dependence  of  mankind  upon  one  another — and  on  the  wholesome  influences  of  the 
gregarious  habits  of  humanity. 

A  third  was  to  this  effect : — 

The  tales  may  be  in  the  first  person  or  in  the  third,  and  may  relate  to  any  season  or 
period.  They  may  be  supposed  to  be  told  to  an  audience  or  to  the  reader,  or  to  be 
penned  by  the  writer  without  knowing  how  they  will  come  to  light.  How  they  come 
to  be  told  at  all  does  not  require  to  be  accounted  for.  If  they  could  express  some  new 
resolution  formed,  some  departure  from  an  old  idea  or  course  that  was  not  quite 
wholesome,  it  might  be  better  for  the  general  purpose.  Yet  even  this  is  not  indis- 
pensable. 

The  following  was  more  elaborate : — 

An  English  trading-ship  (with  passengers  aboard),  bound  for  California,  is  supposed 
to  have  got  foul  of  an  iceberg,  and  becomes  a  wreck.  The  crew  and  passengers,  not 
being  very  many  in  number,  and  the  captain  being  a  cool  man  with  his  wits  about  him, 
one  of  the  boats  was  hoisted  out  and  some  stores  were  got  over  the  side  into  her  before 
the  ship  went  down.  Then  all  hands,  with  a  few  exceptions,  were  got  into  the  boat 
— an  open  one — and  they  got  clear  of  the  wreck,  and  put  their  trust  in  God. 

The  captain  set  the  course  and  steered,  and  the  rest  rowed  by  spells  when  the  sea 
was  smooth  enough  for  the  use  of  the  oars.  They  had  a  sail  besides.  At  sea  in  the 
open  boat  for  many  days  and  nights,  with  the  prospect  before  them  of  being  swamped 
by  any  great  wave,  or  perishing  with  hunger,  the  people  in  the  boat  began,  after  a 
while,  to  be  horribly  dispirited.  The  captain,  remembering  that  the  narration  of  stories 
had  been  attended  with  great  success  on  fonper  occasions  of  similar  disasters,  in  pre* 
venting  the  shipwrecked  persons'  minds  from  dwelling  on  the  horrors  of  their  condition, 
proposed  that  such  as  could  tell  anything  to  the  rest  should  tell  it.  So  the  stories  are 
introduced. 

The  adventures  narrated  need  not  of  necessity  have  happened  in  all  ca.nes  to  the 
^>eople  in  the  boat  themselves.    Neither  does  it  matter  wlwther  they  are  tokl  in  the 


w 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR.  44S 


.  first  or  in  the  third  person.  The  whole  narrative  of  the  wreck  will  be  given  hy  the 
captain  to  the  reader  in  introducing  the  stories,  also  the  final  deliverance  of  the 
people.  There  are  persons  of  both  sexes  in  the  boat.  The  writer  of  any  story  may 
suppose  any  sort  of  person — or  none,  if  that  be  all — as  the  captain  will  identify  him  it 
need  be.  But  among  the  wrecked  there  might  naturally  be  the  mate,  the  cook,  the 
carpenter,  the  armorer  (or  worker  in  iron),  the  boy,  the  bride  passenger,  the  bride- 
groom passenger,  the  sister  passenger,  the  brother  passenger,  the  mother  or  father 
passenger-,  or  son  or  daughter  passenger,  the  runaway  passenger,  the  child  passenger, 
the  old  seaman,  the  toughest  of  the  crew,  etc.,  etc. 

This  was  the  skeleton  or  ribs  of  "  The  Wreck  of  the  Golden 
Mary/'  which,  had  extraordinary  success,  though  some  critics 
were  merry  on  the  idea  of  the  suffering  passengers  having  to 
listen  to  such  long  narratives — one  adding,  that  he  wondered 
that  it  did  not  precipitate  the  catastrophe. 
Another  was  more  general : — 

Mr.  Pickens  is  desirous  that  each  article  in  the  new  year's  number  of  Household 
Words  shall  have  reference  to  something  new^  and  I  beg  to  ask  you  to  assist  us  iu  pro- 
ducing a  paper  expressive  of  that  always  desirable  quality. 

I  can  give  you  no  better  hint  of  the  idea  than  the  roughest  notion  of  what  one  or 
two  of  the  titles  of  the  papers  might  be :  A  New  Country ;  A  New  Discovery  (in 
science,  art,  or  social  life)  ;  A  New  Lover ;  A  New  Play,  or  Actor,  or  Artress ;  A  New 
Boy. 

Your  own  imagination  will  doubtless  suggest  a  topic  or  a  story  which  would  har- 
monize with  the  plan. 

Yet  one  more : — 

In  order  that  you  may  be  laid  under  as  little  constraint  as  possible,  Mr.  Dickens 
-wishes  to  present  the  requirements  of  the  number,  in  the  following  general  way  : — 

A  story  of  adventure — that  is  to  say,  involving  some  adventurous  kind  of  interest — 
would  be  best  adapted  to  the  design.  It  may  be  a  story  of  travel  or  battle,  or  im- 
prisonment, or  escape,  or  shipwreck,  or  peril  of  any  kind — peril  from  storm,  or  from 
being  benighted  or  lost ;  or  peril  from  fire  or  water.  It  m?iy  relate  to  sea  or  land.  It 
may  be  incidental  to  the  life  of  a  soldier,  sailor,  fisherman,  miner,  grave-digger,  en- 
gineer, explorer,  peddler,  merchant,  servant  of  either  sex,  or  any  sort  of  watcher— from 
a  man  in  a  lighthouse,  or  a  coastguardsman,  to  an  ordinary  night  nurse.  There  is  no 
necessary  limitation  as  to  the  scene,  whether  abroad  or  at  home ;  nor  as  to  the  time, 
within  a  hundred  years.  Nor  is  it  important  whether  the  story  be  narrated  in  the  first 
person  or  ia  the  third.  Nor  is  there  any  objection  to  its  being  founded  on  some  ex- 
pedition. 

In  connection  with  this  matter,  I  may  say,  that  nothing 
was  more  delightful  than  the  unrestrained  way  in  which  he 
confided  his  plans  about  his  own  stories,  or  discussed  others 
connected  with  mine ;  imparting  quite  a  dramatic  interest  and 
color  to  what  might,  as  mere  business  details  have  been,  left 
to  his  deputy. 


44^       ,  THE  LIBRA'R  Y  MA GAZINE. 

Once,  iu  a  little  town  in  Wales,  I  had  seen  a  quaint  local 
museum,  formed  by  an  old  ship  captain,  who  had  collected 
odds  and  ends  of  his  profession,  mostly  worthless ;  much  like 
what  is  described  in  "  Little  Pedlington."  The  oddest  feature 
was  the  garden,  in  whidh  he  had  planted  various  figure-heads 
.  ot  vessels,  Dukes  of  York  and  others,  who  gazed  on  the 
visitors  with  an  extraordinary  stare ;  half  ghastly,  half  gro- 
tesque. This  seems  to  furnish  a  hint  for  the  machinery  of  one 
of  his  Christmas  stories,  and  was  suggested  to  him. 

That  notion  of  the  shipbreaker's  garden  (he  wrote,  November,  1865)  takes  my  fancj* 
strongly.  If  I  had  not  been  already  at  work  upon  the  Christmas  Number  when  you 
suggested  it,  I  think  I  must  have  tned  my  hand  upon  it.  As  it  is,  I  often  revert  to  it, 
and  go  about  and  about  it,  and  pat  it  into  new  forms,  much  as  the  buttermen  in  the 
shops  (who  have  something  of  a  literary  air  at  their  wooden  desks)  pat  the  butter.  I 
have  been  vexed  at  not  being  able  to  get  your  story  into  *'  Dr.  Marigold."  I  tried  it 
again  and  again,  but  could  not  adapt  its  length  to  the  other  requirements  of  the 
Number.  Once  I  cut  it,  but  was  not  easy  afterwards,  and  thought  it  best  to  restore 
the  excision  and  leave  the  whole  for  a  regular  Number.  The  difficulty  of  fitting  and 
adapting  this  annual  job  is  hardly  to  be  imagined  without  trying  it.  For  the  rest,  I 
hope  you  will  like  the  Doctor — and  know  him  at  once — as  he  speaks  for  himself  in  the 
first  paper  and  the  last.  Also  I  commend  to  your  perusal  a  certain  short  story, 
headed  "  To  be  taken  with  a  grain  of  salt." 

I  hope  you  are  in  force  and  spirits  with  your  new  story,  and  hope  you  noticed  in  the 
Times  the  other  day  that  our  friend is  married  ! 

How  amazing  this  modesty,  and  these  excuses  for  not  using 
what  another  would  have  simply  said  he  found  "  unsuited  to 
the  magazine." 

As  I  look  over  the  records  of  his  interest  in  my  undeserving 
scribble,  there  comes,  mingled  with  pain  and  regret  for  this 
genial,  never-flagging  friend,  something  of  a  little  pride  in 
having  gained  the  interest  of  so  true  and  appreciative  a 
nature.  It  will  be  seen  how  he  encouraged — how  even 
grateful  he  appeared  to  be,  for  anything  he  thought  good  or 
successful ;  and  how  patient  and  apologetic  he  was  under 
circumstances  where  his  good  will  and  good  nature  were 
tried.  It  was  so  for  a  long  period  of  years ;  he  was  the  same 
from  beginning  to  end  ;  no  caprice ;  steady,  firm,  treu  und  fest. 
Carlyle,  in  a  single  line,  gave  the  truest  estimate  of  him. 

Another  trait  in  him  was  his  unfailing  pleasure  in  commu- 


;^  DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR,  447 

nicating  some  little  composition  of  which  he  was  particularly 
pleased ;  or  he  would  tell  of  some  remarkable  story  that  he 
had  been  sent,  or  would  send  one  of  his  own  which  he 
fancied  hugely.  It  was  a  source,  too,  of  pleasant,  welcome 
surprise  to  find  how  he  retained  in  his  memory,  and  would 
quote,  various  and  sundry  of  your  own  humbler  efforts — 
those  that  had  passed  into  his  own  stock  associations.  These 
generally  referred  to  some  experience  or  humorous  adven- 
ture, or  it  might  be  some  account  of  a  dog. 

After  two  or  three  years  of  industrious  practice  in  short 
stories  and  essays,  I  had  fancied  I  could  succeed  in  novel- 
writing  with  a  first  attempt,  and  timidly  suggested  that  I 
might  "  try  my  hand "  in  his  weekly  journal.  He  at  once 
agreed,  and  good-naturedly  had  about  half  a  volume  "  set  up," 
so  as  to  give  the  production  every  chance  in  the  reading. 
But  the  attempt  was  immature  ;  its  waxen  wings  melted,  and 
he  was  obliged  to  decline.  By  and  by  1  got  a  new  pair,  and, 
making  a  formal  attempt  in  two  volumes,  was  lucky  enough  to 
make  a  success. 

The  history  of  this  little  transaction  will  be  found  interest- 
ing, not,  of  course,  from  my  own  share,  but  as  illustrating 
that  charm  of  hearty  good  will  which  marked  every  act  of  his 
where  his  friends  were  concerned.  Here  also  enters  on  the 
scene  his  faithful  coadjutor  and  assistant,  W.  H.  Wills;  a 
sterling  character,  practical,  business-like,  and  yet  never  let- 
ting his  natufally  friendly  temper  be  overcome  by  the  stern 
necessities  of  his  office.  He  had  a  vast  amount  of  business, 
as  may  be  conceived ;  yet  his  letters,  of  which  I  have  some 
hundreds  before  me  now,  were  always  playful,  amusing, 
clever,  and  written  in  a  flowing  lengthy  style — even  to 
"  crossing."  His  sagacity  was  heartily  appreciated  by  his 
chi^f.  He  ever  appeared  a  most  favorable  specimen  of  the 
successful  literar)'-  man. 

At  the  risk  of  becoming  more  personal,  I  may  enter  a  little 
at  length  on  the  subject  of  what  Lamb  calls  the  "  kindly  en- 


448 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 


gendure  "of  this  story— which,  in  truth,  has  some  flavor  of  the 
romance  of  authorship.  I  had  sent  my  successful  two-volume 
venture  to  my  friend : — 

My  Dear ,  — Do  not  condemn  me  unheard  (I  know  you  are  putting  on  the  hlack 

cap),  i  have  been  silent,  but  only  on  paper  ;  for  a  fortnight  after  you  last  heard  from 
me  I  was  roaring  with  pain.  The  first  use  of  my  convalescence  was  to  read  your  story 
— like  a  steam  engine.  My  impression  is  that  it  is  the  best  novel  I  have  read  for  years ; 
why  I  think  so  I  need  not  tell  you.  I  posted  off  with  it  to  Dickens,  whose  impression 
of  it  results  in  this :  that  we  should  like  you  to  write  a  novel  for  All  the  Year  Round. 
If  you  respond  to  that  wish,  it  will  afford  m«  very  great  pleasure. 

In  that  case,  it  would  be  necessary  for  you  to  begin  at  once  ;  for  should  you  make  a 
hit  with  your  plot,  we  would  require  to  publish  the  first  installment  in  September  next. 
The  modus  operandi  I  propose  is  this :  let  us  have  a  rough  sketch  of  your  plot  and 
characters ;  Dickens  would  consider  it,  offer  you  suggestions  for  improvement  if  he 
saw  fit,  or  condemn  it,  or  accept  it  as  you  present  it  if  he  saw  no  ground  for  remark. 
In  case  of  a  negative,  you  would  not  mind,  perhaps,  trying  another  programme.  I 
need  not  tell  you  how  great  an  advantage  it  would  bie  for  you  to  work  under  so  great  a 
master  of  the  art  which  your  novel  shows  you  to  know  the  difficulties  of  ;  and  your 
artistic  sympathies  will,  I  know,  prompt  you  to  take  full  advantage  of  hints  which  he 
would  gi\  e  you  not  only  in  the  construction  and  conduct  of  your  story,  but  in  details, 
as  you  proceed  with  it  in  weekly  portions. 

Experience  has  shown  us  that  the  pre-appearance  of  a  novel  in  our  pages,  instead  of 
occupying  the  field  for  after-publication  in  volumes,  g^ves  an  enormous  stimulus  to 
the  issue  in  complete  form.  We  can,  therefore,  insure  you  for  ypur  work,  if  it  will  fill 
three  volumes,  five  hundred  pounds  (£500),  part  of  which  we  would  pay  for  our  use 
of  your  manuscript,  and  part  the  publisher  of  the  volumes  would  pay ;  but  we  would, 
in  case  of  acceptance,  guarantee  you  £500,  whatever  the  republication  may  fetch. 

Think  this  over,  and  when  your  thoughts  are  matured,  let  me  have  them  in  your 
next  letter. 

This  was  almost  thrilling  to  read.  Every  word  was  as 
inspiring  as  the  blast  of  a  trumpet.  It  will  be  rioted  how 
pleased  the  writer  is  at  the  very  communication  of  his  intel- 
ligence. And  then  the  *'  pecune  " !  Five  hundred  pounds ! 
The  dilligent  magazine-writer  might  exclaim  with  one  of  Jer- 
rold's  characters,  "  Is  there  so  much  money  in  *the  world !  " 
It  was  really  liberal  and  generous. 

*  No  time  was  lost  in  setting  to  work.  I  had  soon  blocked 
out  a  plan — ^what  dramatists  call  a  scenario — and  had,  about 
as  soon,  set  to  work,  and  written  a  good  many  chapters  and 
sent  them  in. 

It  will  now  be  characteristic  to  see  what  pains  were  taken 
— how  heads  were  laid  together  to  improve  and  make  good — 
all  under  the  master's  directions  and  inspirations — who,  as  he 


-  DICICENS  in  the  EDITOR'S  CHAIR.  449 

said  often,  always  gave  to  the  public  his  best  labor  and  best 
work.  This  constancy  always  seemed  to  me  wonderful.  He 
never  grew  fagged  or  careless,  or  allowed  his  work  to  be  dis- 
tasteful to  him.  This  is  a  most  natural  feeling,  and  comes 
with  success ;  and  there  is  a  tendency  to  "  scamp  *'  work  when 
the  necessity  for  work  is  less.  Mr.  Thackeray  confessed  to 
this  feeling — in  the  days  when  he  became  recherche — and 
found  a  sort  of  distaste  to  his  work  almost  impossible  to  sur- 
mount. 

The  first  questions  started  on  this  great  business  came  from 
my  old  friend  the  sub-editor,  the  master's  excellent  auxiliary. 
It  will  be  seen  how  stanch  he  was,  and  true  to  both  interests 
— ^that  of  his  journal  and  that  of  the  writer : — 

I  am  nearly  as  anxious  as  you  are  about  your  story.  I  may  tell  you  that  my  judg- 
ment is  in  favor  of  it,  so  far  as  it  has  gone ;  but  Dickens,  while  never  wholly  losing 
sight  of  the  main  end,  object,  and  purpose  of  the  story,  often  condemns  one  because 
its  details  are  ill  done.  He  takes  such  infinite  pains  with  the  smallest  touches  of  his 
awn  word-pictures,  that  he  gets  impatient  and  disgusted  with  repetitions  of  bad  writing 
and  carelessness  (often  showing  want  of  respect  for,  as  well  as  ignorance  of,  the  com- 
monest principles  of  art).  I,  perhaps,  sin  too  much  on  the  other  side.  I  say  that  the 
general  public— whom  we  address  in  our  large  circulation— are  rather  insensible  than 
otherwise  to  literary  grace  and  correctness ;  that  they  arc  often  intensely  excited  by 
incidents  conveyed  to  their  minds  in  the  worst  grammar. 

Mind,  I  only  make  these  remarks  for  your  guidance.  My  advice  to  you  is,  write  for 
all  your  proofs,  go  over  them  very  carefully.  Take  out  as  many  Carlyleisms  as  you 
can  see  (your  writing  abounds  with  them),  make  clear  that  which  is  here  and  there 
obscure  without  a  realder's  consideration  and  retracing  of  the  text — a  labor  which  novel- 
readers  especially  hate ;  in  short,  put  as  high  a  polish  on  your  details  as  you  can,  and 
I  may  almost  promise  you  success.  Dickens  is  vagabondizing  at  present,  and  wonH  be 
back  for  ten  days  ;  get  all  ready  by  that  time. 

It  is  not  impossible  that  we  may  have  to  call  upon  you  suddenly  to  let  us  commence 
the  story  in  a  week  or  two ;  but  it  may  be  deferred  for  a  year.  At  all  events,  I  can 
promise  you  a  decision  on  all  points  when  G.  D.  shows  up. 

I  find  a  fault  in  your  other  novel  which  is  creeping  into  Miss ;  a  want  of  earnest- 
ness ;  a  Thackerayish  pretense  of  indifference,  which  you  do  not  feel,  to  the  stronger 
emotions  and  statements  of  your  characters.  If  you  excite  the  emotions  of  your 
readers,  and  convey  the  idea  that  you  feel  a  lofty  contempt  for  emotion  in  general, 
they  feel  sold,  and  will  hate  your  want  of  taking  them  in. 

I  don't  say  a  word  in  praise  of  your  new  venture,  though  I  think  a  great  deal.  I 
want  you  and  your  writing  to  make  a  hit,  not  only  with  C.  D.  but  with  the  public  ;  and 
-vrhat  i  have  said  (which  will  make  you  detest  me  at  least  till  after  church-time  on  Sun- 
day) may  be  a  small  contribution  towards  that  object,  which  I  do  most  .earnestly  desire. 
About  Monday,  when  your  heart  is  open  to  forgiveness  of  sins  like  mine  (or  before  it 
proves  less  obdurate),  let  me  hear  from  you. 

Oflte  other  thtn^;.  You  see  Sala's  story  lies  chiefly  in  Paris.  Could  you  not  adopt 
my  suggestion  of  giving  your  story  its  natural  progression,  and  postponing  chapter  tb* 

L.  M.— IS 


"45^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

to  its  firet  natural  place  in  the  story?  My  conviction  is  that  you  would  make  an 
improvement  thereby  in  all  respects. 

After  many  debates,  it  was  determined  to  attemptthe  ven- 
ture : — 

Next  let  me  convey  to  you  the  intelligence  (wrote  our  chief),  that  I  resolve  to  launch 
it,  fully  confiding  in  your  conviction  of  the  power  of  the  story.  On  all  business  points 
Wills  will  communicate  with  you.  * 

The  only  suggestion  I  have  to  make  as  to  the  MS.  in  hand  and  type  is  that wants 

relief.  It  is  a  disagreeable  character,  as  you  mean  it  to  be,  and  I  should  be  afraid  to  do 
so  much  with  him,  if  the  case  were  mine,  without  taking  the  taste  of  him  here  and 
there  out  of  the  reader's  mouth.  It  is  remarkable  that,  if  you  do  not  administer  a  dis- 
agreeable character  carefully,  the  public  have  a  decided  tendency  to  think  that  the 
st<n-y  is  disagreeable,  and  not  merely  the  fictitious  person. 

What  do  you  think  of  this  title ?    It  is  a  good  one  in  itself,  and  would  express 

the  eldest  sister^s  pursuit,  and,  glanced  at  now  and  then  in  the  text,  would  hold  the 
reader  in  suspense.  Let  me  know  your  opinion  as  to  the  title.  I  need  not  assure  you 
that  the  greatest  care  will  be  taken  of  you  here,  and  that  we  shall  make  you  as 
thoroughly  well  and  widely  known  as  we  possibly  can.  ^ 

Now,  this  was  all  encouraging  and  cordial  to  a  degree. 
Yet,  I  seem  to  see  the  editor  here,  more  or  less ;  and  friendly 
and  good-natured  as  these  assurances  were,  in  the  case  of  an 
acquiescence,  it  will  be  seen  what  a  difference  there  was  in 
his  tone  as  time  went  on,  and  he  was  good  enough  to  have  a 
"  liking,"  as  it  is  called,  for  the  writer ;  even  the  slightly  au- 
thoritative air  that  is  here  disappeared.  I  frankly  confess 
that,  having  met  innumerable  men,  and  having  had  dealings 
with  innumerable  men,  I  never  met  one  with  an  approach  to 
his  genuine,  unaffected,  unchanging  kindness,  or  one  that 
ever  foun,d  so  sunshiny  a  pleasure  in  doing  one  a  kindness. 
I  cannot  call  to  mind  that  any  request  I  ever  made  to  him  was 
ungranted,  or  left  without  an  attempt  to  grant  it. 

The  letter  just  quoted  conveys  a  most  precious  lesson  to 
the  novel-writer — whose  craft,  indeed,  requires  many  lessons. 
Having  written  nearly  twenty  novels  myself,  I  may  speak 
with  a  little  experience,  and  frankly  own  that  it  was  not  till  I 
had  passed  my  dozenth  that  I  began  to  learn  some  few  prin- 
ciples of  the  art ;  having  written,  as  so  many  do,  "  as  the 
spirit  moved,"  or  by  fancied  inspiration. 

The  allusion  to  the  "bold  advertisement"  was,  indeed, 
^-^ndsomely  carried  out.    Few  would  *have  such  advantagciJ 


JT 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR,  45 1 

of  publicity  as  one  writing  a  novel  for  All  the  Year  Round 
in  those  days.  There  was  the  prestige  of  association  with  the 
master,  while  the,  condition  in  which  your  work  was  brought 
before  the  public  was  truly  effective. 

All  this  happily  settled,  the  affair  was  duly  announced.  No 
expense  was  spared.  Vivid  yellow  posters,  six  or  seven  feet 
long,  proclaimed  the  name  of  the  new  story  in  black  brilliant 
characters  on  every  blank  wall  and  boarding  in  the  kingdom  ; 
while  smaller  and  more  convenient  sized  proclamations,  in 
quarto,  as  it  were  told  this  tale  in  more  modest  way.  So  that, 
if  there  was  really  any  light  at  all,  it  was  not  under  a  bushel. 
I  had  a  pride  in,  and  fondness  for,  these  testimonials,  and 
have  religiously  preserved  all  that  dealt  with  my  own  efforts ; 
a  kind  of  literature,  as  may  be  conceived,  of  a  bulky  sort,  and 
filling  great  space  as  they  accumulated.  When  debating  ef- 
fectual titles  for  these  and  other  writings,  I  recall  his  taking 
me  to  his  room  without  telling  me  what  he  had  selected,  and, 
by  the  way  of  test  or  surprise,  exhibiting  one  of  these  gigantic 
proclamations  stretched  at  full  length  across  the  floor  of  the 
room.  "What  do  you  think?"  he  would  ask.  "You  must 
know,"  he  would  add,  his  eye  beginning  to  twinkle  with 
merriment,  "that  when  Wills  corrects  the  proofs  of  these 
things,  he  has  to  go  on  his  knees,  with  a  brush  and  pot  of 
paint  beside  him ! "  The  cost  of  this  system  of  advertising 
was  enormous  in  the  year,  but  everything  was  done  magnifi- 
cently at  "  the  office." 

A  little  later  I  was  informed  that — 

The  next  number  we  make  up  will  contain  the  first  part  of  your  story.    I  like  what 

you  have  done  extremely.     But  I  think  the  story  flags  at  's  '*  chaff."    There  is 

too  much  of  it.    A   few  pregnant  hits  at would  do  all  you  want  better.    Again 

the  C party  requires,  I  think,  the  exciseman  up  to  the  quadrille,  where  the  real 

business  of  the  evening  begins.  You  see,  in  publishing  hebdomadally,  any  kind  of 
alternation  is  ver>'  dangerous.     One  must  hit,  not  only  hard,  but  quick. 

Please  look  well  to  the  passage  revealing  the  acceptance  of  F —  V — ,and  overthrow 
of  H — ,  in  the  bedroom,  after  the  party.  This  is  a  strong  situation,  and,  to  my  mind, 
i»  confusedly  expressed— in  fact,  can  only  be  vaguely  guessed  at  by  the^eader. 

More  criticism  !    Everything  goes  on  well  so  far;  but  I  tell  you  what  we  all  yearn 

for — some  show  of  tenderness  from  somebody :  the  little  glimpse  of  B ,  a  number 

or  two  agOf  with^  his  little  touch  of  humor-feeling,   was  refreshing   in  the  highest 


4S2  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

degree.    The  characters  seem  to  be  all  playing  at  chess — uncommonly  well,  mind  you 
—but  they  neither  do  nor  say  anything  sympathetic. 

As  the  story  advanced  the  councils  multiplied,  as  well  as 
the  suggestions  and  improvements.  Experiments  even  were 
made  in  particular  directions,  and  an  episode  was  furnished 
'*  to  see  how  it  would  look  in  print; "  sheets  being  " set  up  '* 
in  this  way  regardless  of  cost,  and  dismissed  as  unsatisfactory. 
AH  this  was  laborious  and  troublesome,  but,  as  was  said,  the 
experiment  was  worfii  making,  and  few  sensible  writers  but 
would  have  welcomed  the  opportunity  of  learning  their  craft 
under  such  a  teacher.  It  would  be  impossible  to  describe  the 
fertility  of  his  resources,  the  ingenuity  exhibited,  the  pains 
and  thought  he  gave  to  the  matter.  Under  such  auspices — 
and  it  was  admitted  that  I  was  a  willing  pupil,  with  equal 
readiness  to  adopt  and  to  carry  out  all  that  was  suggested — 
the  work  benefited,  it  need  hardly  be  said. 

"  Is  it  worth  your  while,"  wrote  my  sub-editor, "  to  be  bothered 
with  a  second  scrawl  merely  to  let  me  say  how  admirable  I 
think  it.  Tender,  tri^e,  and  too  pathetic  even  for  an  old  hack 
waiting  for  his  dinner  to  read  with  dry  eyes.  My  first  mouth- 
ful would  have  choked  me  if  I  had  not  written  this." 

The  end  gained  was  satisfactory  to  all  concerned.  The  work 
was  successful,  passed  through  several  editions,  and  still 
sells.  The  copyright  was  disposed  of  for  a  sum  nearly  equal 
to  what  was  allotted  to  me.  Indeed,  before  it  was  concluded, 
the  following  pleasant  communication,  as  full  of  sensible 
advice  as  '^  was  agreeable,  set  me  to  work  again.  One  curious 
evidence  of  its  success  was  the  fact  that  a  firm  of  perfumers 
in  Bond  Street  named  a  new  perfume  after  the  story,  and 
this  fragrance  has  much  favor  among  the  ladies,  and  is  largely 
sold  to  this  hour. 

lo  Paean  !  I  congratulate  you  on  being  at  last  able  to  flourish  the  word  Fiim.  I 
have  not  yet  read  a  line  of  your  ending,  and  this  omission  will  give  you  a  better  relish 
for  what  I  am  going  to  say:  dictated  solely  by  the  ** merits"  already  developed, 
Diclceiis*s  answer  to  the  wish  you  express  at  the  end  of  your  letter  was  a  glad  aOMl 
eager  **  Yes ;"  in  which  I  heartily  and  cordially  concurred,  as  you  may  guess.  Let  \ 
next  novel  be  for  us.    We  shall  want  it  in  from  twelve  to  eighteen  months*  \ ' 


nwf^s 


DICKENS  IN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR.  453 


if  I  may  venture  some  advice,  let  me  urge  upon  you  to  employ  at  least  a  quarter  of  it 
in  constructing  the  skeleton  of  it  from  the  end  of  your  story,  or  modifying  any  little 
detail  in  the  beginning  of  it — if  you  would  set  3'ourself  the  task  of  at  least  seeing  land  . 
before  you  plunge  into  your  voyage,  with  no  chance  of  veering,  or  "backing  or  fill- 
ing," or  shortening  sail. 

I  am  sure  you  have  a  great  chance  before  you,  if  you  will  only  give  your  powers 
their  full  »wing ;  especially  if  you  will  let  us  see  a  leetle  of  the  good  side  of  human 
nature.  '  Ever  very  faithfully  yours, 

W.  H.W. 

I  have  many  proof-sheets  by  me,  corrected  by  his  own 
hand  in  the  most  painstaking  and  elaborate  way.  The  way  he 
used  to  scatter  his  bright  touches  over  the  whole,  the  spark- 
ling word  of  his  own  that  he  would  insert  here  and  there,  gave 
a  surprising  point  and  light.  The  finish,  too,  that  he  imparted 
was  wonderful ;  and  the  "  dashes,"  stops,  shiftings,  omissions, 
were  all  valuable  lessons  for  writers. 

On  another  occasion,  when  he  did  not  '*  see,"  as  he  says,  the 
point  of  another  attempt — and,  indeed,  there  was  not  much — 
he  excuses  himself  in  this  fashion  for  not  using  it : — 

Don't  hate  me  more  than  you  can  help,  when  I  say  I  have  been  reading  in  "  Six- 
penny Shakespeare,"  and  that  I  don't  see  it.  I  don't  think  this  joke  is  worth  the  great 
ingenuity,  and  I  don't  think  the  public  would  take  it.  "  WiUs  and  Will-making'* 
most  excellent.     I  have  placed  it  in  two  parts  already.     It  is  capital. 

Once  again,  don't  hate  me  more  than  you  can  help,  and  your  petitioner  will  ever 
pray.    (I  don't  know  what  petitioners  pray  for.)  Ever  yours,  C.  D. 

So  also,  when  an  unhappy  monkey,  trained  to  ride  in  a 
circus,  offered  a  tempting  subject  for  a  paper  which  I  had  sent 
to  him,  he  answers  in  the  same  spirit : — 

I  am  afraid  the  monkey  is  anticipated.  It  has  been  exceedingly  well  done  by  Buck- 
land  in  *^  Land  and  Water,"  and  would  be  the  day  after  the  fair.  I  was  going  to 
place  him  to-day,  but  in  the  meantime  caught  sight  of  Buckland's  paper,  which  has 
been  extensively  copied  both  in  weekly  and  d>untry  journals. 

Indeed,  the  pleasant  ardor  with  which  he  followed  the 
course  of  a  story,  anticipated  its  coming,  debated  its  name, 
and  helped  its  writer  over  various  stiles,  and  even  extricated 
him  from  bogs,  was  all  in  the  same  spirit.  His  aid  as  to  the 
name  and  conduct  of  the  story  was,  it  may  be  conceived, 
invaluable.  Many  and  earnest  were  the  consultations  upon 
this  matter  of  naming.  No  one  had  a  nicer  ear  as  to  what 
'  ^ould  "  hit "  or  suit  the  taste  of  the  town* 


L: 


"454 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 


I  am  glad  to  hear  that  the  story  is  ^o  far  advanced  now  that  you  think  well  of  it, 
for  I  have  no  doubt  that  you  are  right.  I  don't  like  either  of  your  names,  for  the 
reason  that  they  don't  seem  to  me  solidly  earnest  enough  for  such  a  story.  But  give 
me  a  little  time  to  think  of  another,  and  I  flatter  myself  that  I  may  suggest  a  good 
one. 

And  again— 

I  think  the  plan  of  the  story  very  promising,  and  suggestive  of  a  remarkably  good, 
new,  and  strong  interest.  What  do  you  think  of  the  pursuing  relative  dying  at  last  of' 
the  same  disorder  as  the  Baronefs  daughter^  and  under  such  circumstances  as  to 
make  out  the  case  of  the  clergyman's  daughter  and  clear  up  the  story  ?  As  for 
example,  suppose  her  husband  himself  does  almost  the  same  thing  in  going  for  kelp 
when  the  man  is  dying.  I  think  I  see  a  fine  story  here.  As  to  the  name.  No,,  cer- 
tainly not.  **  What  could  she  do  ?  "  No,  again.  *'  What  will  he  do  with  it  ?  "  *  Caa 
he  forgive  her  ?  "     "  Put  yourself  in  his  place."    Remember  these  titles. 

And  again — 

July,  i863. 

"  O  where  !  O  where !  is  the  rest  of  Tom  Butler?  "     A  hasty  word.    I  prefer 

(without  the  article).     I  cannot  possibly  answer  the  question  Mr. does  me  the 

honor  to  propose,  without  knowing  what  length  of  story  is  meant. 

I  answer  your  letter  to  myself.     It  is  perfectly  understood  between  us  that  you 

write  the  long  serial  story  next  after .    That  is  a  positive  engagement.  -When  I 

told to  write  to  you  respecting  a  shorter  story  meanwhile,  I  meant  that  to  be 

quite  apart  from,  and  over  and  above,  the  aforesaid  long  one.    May  I  look  at  the 
chapters  you  speaik  of  on  Decoration  ? 

I  am  in  a  brilliant  condition,  -thank  God.  Rest,  and  a  little  care  immediately, 
unshook  the  railway  shaking;. 

I  don't  quite  understand  from  your  kind  note  (forwarded  here  this  morning)  whether 
— — -  purposes  to  write  these  papers  or  whether  he  suggests  them  to  you.  In  either  case, 
I  shall  be  delighted  to  have  them.  It  is  necessary  that  they  should  appear  under  sepa— 
rate  headings,  each  with  its  own  title,  as  we  have  already  three  running  titles.    Your 

story is  going  on  famously,  and  I  think  will  make  a  hit.     I  had  a  letter  from  W — 

C—  yesterday,  much  interested  in  perceiving  your  idea,  and  in  following  your  working 

of  it  out.    We  purpose  being  in on  Thursday,  and  going  on  that  afternoon.    I 

hope  we  shall  find  you  in  readiness  to  go  along  with  us. 

1865. 

Tour  hint  that  you  are  getting  on  with  your  story,  and  liked  it,  was  more  than 
golden  intelligence  to  me  in  foreign  parts.  The  intensity  of  the  heat  in  Paris  and  in 
the  Provinces  was  such  that  I  found  nothing  else  so  refreshing  in  the  course  of  my 
rambles. 

Make  yourself  quite  easy.  There  is  not  the  slightest  need  to  hurry,  and  you  can 
take  your  own  time.  I  have  a  story  in  two  parts  still  to  place  in  numbers  not  yet 
made  up.    Until  Wednesday,  and  always. 

^     So  again — 

It  strikes  me  that  a  quaintly  expressive  title  for  such  a  book  would  be  "  The  — .** 
What  do  you  think  of  it  ? 

"The  eminent  literary  personage,'*  as  he  called  him,  had 
now  other  anibitions — trying  his  hand  at  a  short  dramatic 
piece.    He  took  charge  of  it,  and  sent  it  to  his  friend  Webster. 


DICKENS  JN  THE  EDITOR'S  CHAIR.  455 

As  it  did  not  suit — others  did,  in  due  time — he  good-naturedly 
broke  the  fall  with  the  following  : — 

The  play  goes  very  glibly,  and  smoothly,  but  I  make  so  bold  as  to  say  you  can  write 
a  much  better  one.  The  most  characteristic  part  in  it  is  much  too  like  Corapton  in 
*'  The  Unequal  Match."  And  the  best  scene  in  it,  where  he  urges  his  wife  to  go  aivay, 
is  so  excessively  dangerous,  that  I  think  the  chances  would  be  very  many  to  one  against 
an  audience's  acceptance  of  it.  Because,  however  drolly  the  situation  is  presented, 
the  fact  is  not  to  be  got  over  that  the  lady  seriously  supposes  her  husband  to  be  in 
league  with  another  man. 

With  some  humiliation  I  must  own  to  trying  the  tolerance 
of  this  most  amiable  of  men  with  various  failures  and  sad 
carelessness  on  many  occasions.  His  printer  would  grumble 
at  the  perfunctory  style  in  which  the  copy  was  presented,  and 
even  in  print  it  was  sometimes  difficult  to  put  matters  in 
shape : — 

My  difficulty  (he  wrote)  about  your  story  has  been  a  report  from  the  printer  that 
the  copy  of  some  part  of  another  story  had  got  mixed  with  it,  and  it  was  impossi- 
ble to  make  sense.  You  were  then  just-gone.  I  waited  until  you  should  have  leisure — 
now  that  I  hear  from  you,  I  tell  you  only  I  have  waited — and  ask :  Is  the  story  made 
straight,  and  is  it  at  the  printer's  ?  Reply,  reply,  reply,  as  Bishop's  duet;  says. 
Reply  also  to  this.     How  long  is  it  ? 

•*  Waited  until  you  should  have  leisure  ! "  There  was  almost 
unlimited  indulgence  in  the  matter  of  changing  and  revising 
printed  pages,  condemned  at  his  author's  suggestion — new  bits 
introduced  here  and  there.  He  had  a  pleasant  joke  in  this 
trying  behavior,  and  vowed  that  I  had  introduced  a  new  term 
in  the  printing-house  **  chapel,"  a  thing  unknown  for  cen- 
turies in  that  most  conservative  of  professions.  These  in- 
troduced columns  and  half-columns  were  denominated,  to 
distinguish  them  from  the  regular  narrative,  as  "  Random.** 
And  a  number  being  brought  by  the  foreman. one  day,  and 

asking  what  this  was,  he  was  told  that  "they  were  Mr. 's 

jRandomsr  The  delight  he  felt  in  this  seemed  to  compensate 
for  any  annoyance.  I  see  the  exuberant  twinkle  in  his  bright 
eye,  and  his  hearty  relish.  At  last,  however,  his  patience 
"wrould  give  wa)  : — 

For  my  sake,  if  not  for  heaven's  (he  would  write),  do,  I  entreat  you,  look  over  your 
manuscript  before  sending  it  to  the  printer.  And  again,  please  keep  on  abrupt  transi- 
tions into  the  present  tense  your  critical  eye.  Tom  Butler,  in  type,  is  just  brought  in. 
I  will  write  to  you  of  him  to-morrow  or  Sunday. 


45^  .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.  \ 

How  gentle  was  this ! 

Once,  however,  and  only  once,  he  delivered  himself  with  a 
severity  that  I  own  was  richly  deserved.  *  Two  novels  were 
being  actually  written  by  "  my  facile  pen "  at  the  same , 
moment,  much  as  a  bare-backed  ridef,  or  rider  of  barebacks, 
would  ride  the  same  number  of  horses  round  the  circus.  At 
the  same  tirne  we  were  preparing  for  a  long  serial  in  his  jour-. 
nal.  "  You  make  me  very  uneasy,"  he. began,  "  on  the  subject 
of  your  new  story  here  by  undertaking  such  an  impossible 
amount  of  fiction  at  one  time.  As  far  as  I  know  the  art  we 
both  pursue,  it  cannot  be  reasonably  carried  on  in  this  way^ 
I  cannot  forbear  representing  this  to  you,  in  the  hope  that  it 
may  induce  you  to  take  a  little  more  into  account  the  neces- 
sity of  care  in  preparation,  and  some  self-denial  in  the  quantity 
doi^e.  I  am  quite  sure  I  write  as  much  in  your  interest  as  my 
own."  How  easily  propitiated  he  was  will  be  seen  when,  on  a 
mere  undertaking  to  be  careful,  he  writes  that — "  Your  expla- 
nation is  (as  it  would  be,  being  yours)  manly  and  honest,  and  I 
am  both  satisfied  and  hopeful."  Nay,  some  weeks  later  he 
recurred  to  the  matter  in  this  strain  : — 

I  am  very  sorry  I  was  not  at  home.  It  gives  me  the  greatest  pleasure  to  receive  such 
good  tidings  of  the  new  story,  and  I  shall  enter  upon  its  perusal  in  proof  with  the 
brightest  appreciation.    Will  you  send  as  much  of  it  as  you  can  spare  to  the  office. 

From  the  Gentleman*s  Magazine. 


JUSTICE  TO  BEACONSFIELD. 

It  is  not,  perhaps,  too  early  to  bespeak  a  fair  and  right  judg- 
ment for  Benjamin  Disraeli,  nor  too  late  to  engage  the  public 
interest  in  the  career  and  character  of  the  remarkable  man, 
who  was  laid  at  rest  in  Hughenden  churchyard,  barely  two 
months  ago.  Nor  is  it  too  much  to  say  that  the  fame  of 
Lord  Beaconsfield — the  deserved  fame,  long  withheld,  at  least 
in  this  country, — has  rapidly  grown  since  his  death.    Ameri- 


JUSTICE  TO  BEACON SFIELD.  45/ 

cans,  many  of  them,  have  only  recently  found  out  the  estima-^ 
lion  in  which  he  was  really  held,  by  opponents  as  well  as 
partisans,  in  his  own  country. 

The  writer  of  this  article  asked  a  member  of  the  Gladstone 
ministry,  last  autumn,  how  Disraeli  was  really  regarded  in 
England  ?  whether  the  cartoons  of  Punch^and  the  less  good- 
natured  diatribes  of.  some  Liberal  journals,  actually  repre- 
sented the  feeling  among  the  party  opposed  to  him  ?  Was  it 
true  that  the  Liberals  looked  upon  Disraeli  as  a  charlatan,  a 
juggler,  and  a  political  Mephistopheles  only  ?  He  promptly 
replied  that  that  sort  of  talk  about  Disraeli  had  ceased  in 
England  twenty  years  ago  ;  that  he  was  universally  conceded 
to  be  a  great  man  ;  that,  while  the  Liberals  very  earnestly  dis- 
sented from  his  policyr  no  one  questioned  either  his  genius 
for  leadership,  his  courage,  his  resources,  or  his  sincerity. 

There  is  ample  testimony  that  this  radical  adversary  of  Dis- 
raeli only  echoed  the  general  Liberal  sentiment  as  to  the  Tory 
chief.  There  is  no  firmer  or  more  devoted  Liberal  leader  in 
England  than  the  Marquis  of  Hartington.  He  for  some  years 
was  the  actual  chief  of  his  party.  He  is  a  frank,  sincere,  high- 
bred statesman.  In  a  speech  delivered  shortly  after  Disraeli's 
death,  he  thus  spoke  of  him,  in  a  Liberal  assemblage : 

"This  I  will  say,  that  while  many  of  us  have  felt  constantly 
and  almost  continuously  called  upon  to  oppose  the  policy 
which  he  advocated,  we  have  all  admired  the  manner  in  which 
he  led  his  great  party  to  ultimate  victory ;  that  in  him  we  had 
a  fair  and  honorable  opponent ;  and  that  when  he  was  Prime 
Minister,  he  directed  his  policy  for  no  mean,  no  petty,  and  no 
personal,  or  even  party  ends ;  and  that  the  policy  which  he 
set  before  himself  was  the  one  which,  in  his  judgment,  was 
best  calculated  to  promote  the  greatness,  honor,  and  pros- 
perity of  England.  I  do  not  use  this  language  now  for  the 
first  time.  As  I  said  before,  I  have  constantly  and  almost 
continuously  had  the  misfortune  to  find  myself  in  opposition 
to  Lord  Beaconsfield ;  but  I  have  always  acknowledged,  ever 


45  8  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GA ZINE. 

in  the  heat  of  party  strife,  the  ability  and  the  hfgli  character 
of  the  great  statesman  who  has  recently  departed  from  us." 

Language  scarcely  less  appreciative  was  used  in  the  House 
of  Commons  by  Disraeli's  life-long  and  often  bitterly  hostile 
rival,  Mr.  Gladstone,  when  it  became  his  duty  to  move  that  a 
national  monument  should  be  erected  to  the  memory  of  the- 
renowned  dead.  Mr.  Gladstone  spoke  in  glowing  terms  of 
Disraeli's  manly  championship  of  his  race,  of  his  indomitable 
courage  in  party  warfare,  and  his  absolute  freedom  from 
political  or  personal  rancor.  He  freely  confessed  his  belief 
that  Disraeli  had  never,  in  spite  of  their  frequent  and  heated 
conflicts,  harbored  any  feeling  of  personal  animosity  to  him- 
self. Indeed,  it  is  quite  well  known  in  England  that  Disraeli's 
admiration  for  Gladstone's  genius  was  ardent,  and  often  and 
very  warmly  expressed.  Gladstone's  speech,  on  the  occasion 
referred  to,  was  so  spontaneous  and  magnanimous,  and,  withal, 
just  a  tribute,  that  Sir  Stafford  Northcote,  the  Troy  leader  in 
the  Commons,  declared  it  to  be  a  nobler  monument  to  Dis- 
raeli's memory  than  any  shaft  of  bronze  or  marble  which  the 
nation  could  erect. 

Many  American  journals  have  taken  a  very  superficial,  and, 
therefore,  a  very  ignorant  and  unjust  view  of  Disraeli's  career 
and  character.  They  have  apparently  taken  the  color  of  their 
view  of  him  from  violent  Liberal  papers  in  England,  or  from 
the  good-humored  chaff  of  Punch.  They  have  echoed  the 
estimate  which  Englishmen  were  wont  to  make  of  Disraeli  a 
quarter  of  a  century  ago,  before  he  had  proved,  by  many  a 
splendid  act  of  leadership  and  statesmanship,  that  he  was 
something  far  more  than  a  dexterous  politician,  or  a  flippant 
pretender  to  statesmanlike  qualities.  It  seems  to  be  full  time 
that  Disraeli's  solid  achievements  as  a  public  man,  as  well  as 
his  fine  personal  character  and  qualities,  should  be  recognized 
and  acknowledged.  Americans,  indeed,  should  be  the  first  to 
admit  his  remarkable  sense  of  foresight,  and  his  ripe  wisdom 
m  political  deduction,   .He  was  the  only  statesman  of  the  first 


JUSTICE  TO  BEACON SFIELD.  459 

rank  in  England — unless  we  put  the  Duke  of  Argyll  and  John 
Bright  in  that  category — who,  from  first  to  last,  not  only  pre- 
dicted that  the  cause  of  the  Union  would  triumph  over  rebell- 
ion, but  expressed  his  sympathy  with  the  North  in  that  strug- 
gle. His  influence  was  vigorously,  and,  to  a  large  degree, 
effectively  used  to  restrain  not  only  his  own  party,  but  the 
British  government,  from  undue  and  disastrous  interference 
in  behalf  of  the  Confederacy.  In  this  respect,  his  vision  took 
a  far  broader  and  more  prophetic  reach  than  that  of  his  rival, 
Gladstone,  who,  with  a  haste  stimulated  by  his  ardent  good 
wishes  for  Southern  triumph,  declared  that  Jefferson  Davis  had 
made  a  nation. 

It  is  futile,  moreover,  to  deny  that  Benjamin  Disraeli  has 
left  a  very  deep  and  enduring  impress  upon  the  legislation  of 
England.  It  is  not  yet,  perhaps,  a  ripe  time  for  judging  fully 
of  the  wisdom  of  all  the  features  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin  ;  but 
this  may  be  said,  that  that  treaty  averted  a  general  European 
war,  deprived  Russia  of  a  large  share  of  her  victory  over  the 
Turk,  and  restored  England  to  a  position  of  high  influence  in 
the  councils  of  the  powers.  Let  it  be  added,  that  Gladstone 
and  the  Liberals  denounced  the  treaty  with  all  their  resources 
of  eloquent  invective;  that  Sir  William  Vernon  Harcourt 
declared  that  it  would  not  endure  forty  days ;  that  Gladstone 
made  it  one  of  the  chief  articles  of  the  tremendous  indict- 
ment which  he  fulminated  against  the  Beaconsfield  govern- 
ment in  his  campaign  in  Mid-Lothian ;  and  yet  that,  no  sooner 
had  these  gentlemen  found  themselves  in  office  than  they 
announced,  that  it  would  be  the  ambition  of  their  foreign 
poHcy  to  fulfill  this  same  obnoxious  treaty  of  Berlin  in  every 
article,  clause,  and  section. 

Whatever  dispute  there  may  be  as  to  the  wisdom  or  folly 
of  that  ^brilliant  international  compact,  there  are  two  meas- 
ures as  to  Disraeli's  authorship  and  championship,  of  which 
there  can  scarcely  be  any  question,  and  the  beneficence  and 
breadth   of  which   few   will   be   found  who   can  deny.    By 


460  ,     THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

'  V 

the  Factory  act,  which  was  Disraeli's  work,  and  which  be- 
came a  law  chiefly  through  his  courageous  advocacy,  the 
hours  of  the  labor  of  women  and  children  in  the  English, 
factories  were  diminished,  and-  the  age  at  which  children 
could  be  thus  employed  at  all  was  advanced.  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  no  recent  English  statute  has  been  more  effectual  in  the 
.remedy  of  a  great  evil,  or  in  the  physical  and  moral  improve- 
ment of  the  industrial  classes,  than  this  Factory  act,  of  which 
Disraeli  was  the  chilmpion,  and  the  philanthropic  John  Bright 
a  bitter  foe. 

Of  the  present  English  electoral  system,  it  may  be  assertecl 
that  Disraeli  is  the  chief  creator.  Grey  and  Russell  admitted 
a  large  body  of  the  commercial  and  middle  classes  to  the  suf- 
frage ;  and  they  swept  away  a  few — and  only  a  few — of  the 
rotten  boroughs.  The  reform  of  1832  was,  after  all,  a  half- 
measure.  But  Disraeli,  by  the  bold,  the  audacious  reform 
of  18^7,  established  the  suffrage  upon  the  broad  basis  of  the 
household.  He  granted  a  vote  to  every  Englishman  who, 
living  in  a  borough,  occupied  a  house.  It  would  be  vain  to 
seardh,  throughout  the  record  of  Gladstone's  legislative 
achievements,  so  broad,  vast,  courageous,  complete  and  sweep- 
ing a  reform  as  this.  The  Tory  chief,  with  the  task  of  lead- 
ing the  stubborn  Tory  party  to  this  "leap  in  the  dark/' 
actually  achieved  what  the  most  advanced  Liberals  shrank 
from  proposing.  He  cut  the  Gordian  knot  of  electoral  ag^ita- 
tion  by  one  great,  sudden,  decisive  blow.  We  will  not  only 
say  that  this  legislative  feat  is  not  paralleled  by  any  act  of 
Gladstone's ;  but  that  English  political  history  will  be  searched 
in  vain  for  so  heroic  and  brilliant  and  successful  a  single  act 
of  statesmanship.  — ^ 

The  popular  idea  in  this  country,  that  Disraeli  Wis  cold, 
enigmatic,  and  mysterious,  is  abundantly  disproved 
testimony  of  those  who  enjoyed  his  intimacy.     His 
ness  of  nature,  indeed,  might  be  inferred  from  many  oi 
public  acts.    No  man  ever  attached  his  friends  to  hii 


JUSTICE  TO  BEACONSFIELD,  461 

stronger  or  more  enduring  bonds.  His  encouragement  to 
young  politicians  has  long  been  proverbial.  He  was  never 
known  to  lose  his  temper  in  Parliament.  His  serene  patience 
was  inexhaustible.  His  moral  character  was  always  stainless. 
He  was  a  conspicuously  faithful,  devoted  and  tender  husband 
to  a  wife  fourteen  years  older  than  himself.  Although  Jew- 
jshly  fond  .of  show,  and  somewhat  of  a  dandy  to  the  last,  his 
life  in  his  house  was  exceedingly  plain  and  simple  ;  and  at  the 
last,  he  gave  a  crowning  evidence  of  his  disdain  of  mere  pomp, 
by  ordaining  that  his  funeral  should  be  modest,  and  that  his 
remains  should  repose,  not  in  the  monument-crowded  Pan- 
theon of  Westminster,  but  by  the  side  of  his  wife,  in  the  ob- 
scurity of  a  Buckinghamshire  village. 

There  were,  indeed,  very  many  lovable  as  well  as  admirable 
traits  in  this  man,  who  rose  so  high  from  so  low  a  starting-point. 
It  is  certain  that  those  who  followed  him  in  politics  were  de- 
voted to  him  heart  and  soul.  He  had  no  semblance  of  a  rival  in 
his  own  party  ranks.  All  men  felt  that  when  he  died,  Tory- 
ism had  lost  its  only  pre-eminent  and  undisputed  chief.  He 
"was  one  of  those  rare  men  of  renown,  of  which  Englishmen' 
could  spontaneously  repeat  the  old  saying,  **We  never  shall 
see  his  like  again."  Another  Benjamin  Disraeli  is  impossible 
for  a  century. 

George  M.  Towle. 


THE  SWORD. 


The  march  of  democracy  is  not  limited  to  mankind  alone  ; 

-the  uprising  of  nouvelles  couches  is  not  confined  to  the  peo- 

j>les  of  the  earth ;  the  undermining  of  the  upper  classes  is  not 

jTCstricted  to  humanity.    The  dismantling  of  aristocracies  is 

1^0  longer  a  merely  mortal  operation  ;  it  has  sapped  away  the 

Bs  of  other  privileges  than  those  of  princes ;  it  has  extern 


462  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

minated  other  prerogatives  than  those  of  blood ;  it  has  sup- 
pressed other  rights  than  those  of  birth.  The  revolutionary- 
spirit  is  swelling  beyond  politics  and  parliaments;  its  action  is 
stretching  outside  societies,  and  is  reaching  above  nations ; 
it  is  pervading  nature  herself,  and  is  even  permeating  matter. 
The  subversiveness  of  our  times-  extends  to  metals  as  well  as 
to  men ;  under  its  dissolving  action — alas  that  we  should  have 
to  say  it ! — steel  has  ceased  to  be  a  gentleman. 

Until  this  nineteenth  century,  steel  had  retained  its  exalted 
place.  It  had  been  assailed  by  gunpowder,  and  it  had  been 
debilitated  by  the  gradual  diminution  of  duels,  but  it  had 
held  its  own ;  its  superb  traditions  had  not  yet  faded ;  the 
knightly  sword  was  still  its  accepted  expression,  still  its  rep- 
resentative idea.  It  is  true  that  steel — though  used  in  Asia 
from  all  time — though  seen,  perhaps,  in  imperial  Rome,  and 
though  introduced  into  Spain  by  the  Arabs  in  the  ninth  cen- 
tury— had  only  been  seriously  known  to  Europeans  since  the 
first  crusade ;  it  is  true  that  the  swords  of  Greece,  of  Spain, 
of  Germany,  of  Gaul,  contained  no  sign  of  it ;  but  for  the 
last  eight  centuries  the  world  had  learned  to  associate  the 
sword  and  steel  together,  and  to  instinctively  regard  them  as 
implying  the  same  conception.  To-day,  that  stately  unity 
has  disappeared.  The  sword  has  been  dethroned  ;  and  steel, 
meanly  forsaking  its  former  self,  repudiating  its  lineage,  its 
alliances,  and  its  traditions,  has  gone  in  for  demagogy.  And 
we  are  the  sad  spectators  of  its  fall. 

What  a  superb  career  it  has  renounced !  It  had  shaped  the 
world  ;  it  had  carved  out  history  ;  it  had  formed  the  nations ; 
it  had  fixed  the  limits  of  languages  and  the  geography  of 
character  and  thought ;  it  had  vanquished  the  strong ;  it  had 
rebuked  the  proud ;  it  had  succored  the  weak ;  it  had  been 
the  arbiter  of  honor,  and  the  accomplisher  of  justice.  The 
sword  was,  as  the  ancient  chronicler  said,  "  the  oldest,  the 
most  universal,  the  most  varied  of  arms ;  the  only  one  which 
has  lived  through  time.    All  peoples  knew  it ;  it  wast  eveiy^ 


THE  SWORD.  463 

where  regarded  as  the  support  of  courage,  as  the  enemy  of 
perfidy,  as  the-matk  of  commandment,  as  the  companion  of 
authority — as  the  emblem  of  sovereignty,  of  power,  of  force, 
of  conquest,  of  fidelity,  and  of  punishment."  All  this  has 
steel  abandoned — to  become  rails !  Look  at  what  it  was,  and 
at  what  it  is.  Its  aspect  was  brilliant ;  its  habits  were  punc- 
tilious; its  manners  were  courtly;  its  connections  were  patri- 
cian; its  functions  were  solemn;  its  contact  was  ennobling; 
even  its  very  vices  were  glittering,  for  most  of  them  were 
simply  the  defects  of  its  superb  qualities.  It  is  true  that  it 
was  sometimes  cruel,  and  that  its  processes  of  action  were 
distinctly  sanguinary ;  but  those  reproaches  apply  to  all  other 
weapons  too.  Throughout  the  ages  it  grandly  held  up  its 
head,  and  haughtily  bore  its  name.  It  lost  no  caste  when  it 
allied  itself  with  lance  and  dagger,  with  battle-axe  and  helm, 
for  they  were  of  its  natural  kindred ;  and  even  when,  in  later 
times,  it  stooped  to  generate  such  lowly  offspring  as  razors, 
lancets,  knives,  and  needles,  the  A^rld  saw  no  real  abasement 
in  the  act,  for  the  chivalrous  blade  was  still  the  image  which 
represented  steel  to  man.  But  now  its  whole  character  has 
changed ;  now,  it  has  thrown  aside  its  gallantry,  its  grace,  its 
glory ;  now  it  has  forsworn  its  pride  for  profit,  its  pomp  for 
popularity.  Steel  is  now  bursting  coarsely  on  the  earth  at  the 
rate  of  thousands  of  tons  a  month.  It  is  positively  being 
made  into  steam-engines,  and  cannon,  and  ships,  and  all  sorts 
of  vulgar,  heavy,  uncomely,  useful  objects.  Worse  than  all, 
it  is  becoming  cheap !  Steel  cheap !  The  steel  of  old,  the 
steel  of  legend  and  of  story,  the  steel  of  the  paladin  and  the 
chevalier,  the  steel  of  the  noble  and  the  brave,  the  steel  of 
honor  and  of  might,  the  steel  that  was  above  price,  that  knew 
not  money  and  cared  naught  for  profit — that  steel  is  no  more. 
It  has  been  driven  contemptuously  out  of  sight  by  metallur- 
gic  persons  called  Bessemer,  and  Krupp,.and  Siemens,  and 
these  destructive  creators  have  put  into  its  place  a  nineteenth 
century  substance,  exactly  fitted  to  a  mercantile  period,  but 
jaosse&siner  no  tie  with  time  or  fame. 


464  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA GAZINE, 

No  more  will  steel  append  its  personal  signature,  its  glar- 
ingly recognizable  autography,  to  the  great  events  of  history. 
The  dagger  that  slew  Caesar,  the  glaive  that  Brennus  hurled 
into  the  scale  to  weigh  against  the  liberty  of  Rome,  the  axe 
that  gashed  off  Mary  Stuart's  head,  the  knife  that  armed  the 
hand  of  Charlotte  Corday  (of  course  they  were  not  all  steel, 
but  they  admirably  represent  the  notion  of  it),  are  mere  faded 
antiquities.  Steel  has  other  functions  to  discharge  now;  it 
has  given  up  marking  dates  in  the  world's  life,  and  has  gone 
in  for  trade;  it  has  ceased  to  be  history,  and  has  become 
actuality ;  it  is  in  a  state  of  new  departure ;  it  no  longer 
incarnates  a  sentiment ;  it  is  nothing  but  a  fact.  It  has  turned 
its  back  on  the  blades  of  Damascus,  on  the  armor  of  Milan, 
on  the  shields  of  Augsburg,  on  the  rapiers  of  Ferrara,  on 
the  halberts  of  Flanders,  on  the  poinards  of  Bilboa,  and,  at 
this  very  moment,  is  forsaking  almost  the  last  refuge  which 
was  left  to  it,  and  is  deserting  the  marvelous  sabers  of  Japan. 
In  the  place  of  its  former  glories  it  is  taking  up  all  sorts  of 
low  associations;  it  is  being  manufactured  in  big  furnaces;  it 
is  being  "cast,"  as  if  it  were  mere  clownish  pig-iron;  it  is 
being  rolled,  as  if  it  were  uncouth  "  bar  "  ;  it  is  condescending 
to  be  boiler-plates,  and  axle-trees,  and  driving-shafts,  and  gird- 
ers.   To  this  is  steel  reduced! 

In  what  else  has  evolution  worked  a  sadder  change  than 
this?  Where  else  has  relentless  progress  stamped  out  a 
nobler  past  ?  Of  course  the  present  development  of  steel  is 
very  serviceable,  and  ver)*^  commercial,  and  very  profitable ; 
and  it  is,  perhaps,  our  duty  to  be  delighted  at  it.  But  views 
and  opinions  are,  after  all,  like  religious  faiths,  affairs  of  tem- 
perament rather  than  of  reason.  Just  as  some  people  regret 
post-chaises,  and  just  as  some  others  mourn  over  th^^ivine 
right  of  kings,  so  it  is  comprehensible  that  a  few  of  us^ay 
deplore  the  disappearance  of  swords,  and  the  desecratid^-^ 
steel.  The  feeling  may  be  absurd,  and  it  is  certainly  pc 
sentimental,  and  altogether  impractical  and  out  of  date 


THE  SWORD,  465 

in  a  conservative  country  like  ours,  there  is  some  excuse  for 
lamenting  the  disappearance  of    landmarks,  and  never  was 
there  a  bigger  or  more  universal  sign-post  than  the  sword, 
for  it  pointed  the  road  to  almost  all  the  ends  of  life.     Men 
were  what  their  swords  made  them.    To  be  '*  as  brave  as  his 
sword  "  was  the  highest  aim  of  a  warrior's  heart.    And  yet  the 
sword  has  vanished  so  completely  that  we  can  scarcely  sup- 
pose the  world  will  ever  see  it  at  its  true   work  again.    A 
lingering  survivor  of  the  family  is  still  to  be  detected  in  the 
French  duelling  tool;  but,  with  the  exception  of  that  pallid, 
sickly  inheritor  of  a  fallen  crown,  all  direct  descendants  of  the 
once  mighty  race  have  died  out.     No  one  can  seriously  pre- 
tend that  the  soldier's  saber  of  to-day  is  anything  but  a  bastard 
of  the  kin ;  it  is  a  vulgar  article  of  commerce—like  skewers 
or  chisels,  or  nails,  supplied  by  contract  from  Liege  or  St. 
Etienne,  from  Solingen  or  Birmingham.     It  has  no  place  in 
the  glorious  lineage  of  fighting  steel ;  it  is  a  mere  article  of 
military  accourtrement ;  amongst  the  tools  of  actual  war,  it 
stands  a  long  way  below  knapsacks,  a  little  above  chin-straps, 
and  about  on  a  level  with  shovels ;  it  has  been  cast  out  into 
the  cold  shade  by  breech-loaders  and  rifled  barrels ;    it  has 
scarcely  any  blood  relationship  with  the  real  sword — ^with  the 
sword  which  was  the  one  essential  weapon  of  every  man  who 
fought.    That  trusty  friend  is  gone  forever — an  awkward  in- 
strument of  inferior  iron,  which,  like  Charles  the    Second's 
promises,  "  no  man  relies  on,"  has  assume^  its  place.     Never 
again  will  poets  sing  of  puissant  falchions,  or  of  adamantine 
blades.    The  Balmung  of  Siegfried,  the  Escalibur  of  Arthur, 
the   prodigious  Mistelstein   which  expunged  two  thousand 
four  hundred  men,  the  Joyeuse  of   Charlemagne,  the  Flam- 
.  berge  of  Renaud,  the  Altecler  of  Oliver,  the  Quersteinbeis  of 
Hakon  which  chopped  in  two  a  millstone,  the  Tisona  and  the 
^olada  of  the  Cid, — all  these,  and  all  their  like,  have  faded 
•  dreams  that  tempt  no  more."    Even  Durandal,  the  epic 
andal  of  Roland,  the  wondrous  brand  that  cleft  the  clif! 


466  THE  LIBRAR  V  MA GAZINE. 

at  Roncesvaux,  and  left  its  yawning  mark  upon  the  Pyreneean 
crest,  has  flickered  into  night,  ^nd  is  bewailed  by  none.  A 
riListy  rough-edged  bar,  purporting  to  represent  it,  is  shown 
to  curious  travelers  in  the  armory  at  Madrid  ;  and  an  equally 
veracious  rival  is  exhibited  in  the  church  of  Rocamadour,  in 
the  department  of  the  Lot;  but  the  true  Durandal  is,  of 
course,  as  the  legends  tell  us,  still  lying  in  the  waters  into 
which  the  dying  hero  flung  it,  as  the  last  blast  of  the  Olifant 
expired  on  his  lips,  in  the  vain  effort  to  call  back  Charlemagne 
to  the  field ;  it  is  still,  undoubtedly,  at  the  bottom  of  the  en- 
chanted poisoned  stream  "  which  passed  by  there."  And 
there,  we  niay  presume,  it  will  remain,  unless  somebody  finds 
it.  No  more  will  champions  hew  a  foe  in  half  at  one  wild 
sweep,  as  Godfrey  and  Conrad  did  to  several  Paynim  in  the 
Holy  Land.  No  more  will  shields  be  split  from  top  to  bottom, 
as  Renaud  treated  the  buckler  of  the  wicked  infidel  Sacri- 
pant.  All  that  sort  of  behavior  is  no  longer  in  our  ways  ;  we 
do  not  work  so  laboriously  in  conflicts  now;  battles  have 
become  lazy,  in  company  with  most  other  acts  of  modem  life. 
Like  stone  cannon-balls,  the  rack,  the  toga,  and  cups  of  hem- 
lock, hard  hitting  has  passed  out  of  our  wants. 

The  ferocity  of  sharp  strokes,  the  immensity  of  savage 
smiting,  which  constituted,  for  thousands  of  years,  the  es- 
sential characteristics  of  the  sword,  form,  however,  but  a  poor 
part  of  its  vast  story.  There  came  into  it,  with  time,  new 
lineaments,  fairer  and  nobler  than  these.  By  small  degrees,  as 
centuries  passed  on,  the  sword  began  to  mount,  its  uses  rose, 
its  functions  soared.  It  never  ceased  to  be  a  slaughterer,  for 
killing  is  the  essence  of  its  being;  but  it  grew  to  be  a  creator 
as  well  as  a  destroyer ;  men  made  of  it  their  great  ennobler." 
Its  touch  upon  the  shoulder  conferred  the  knighthood  which 
soldiers  longed  to  win ;  and  reverence  for  it  waxed  so  deep 
that  its  simple  presence  on  the  hip  was  taken  to  be  sufficient 
evidence  that  its  wearer  was,  to  some  extent  at  least,  a  gentle- 
man.   It  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  one  accepted  emblem  <rf 


THE  SWORD,  467 

manly  pride,  as  the  outer  symbol  of  all  that  men  prized  most 
— their  courage,  their  liberty,  and  their  honor.  The  practice 
of  disarming  captives  had  naturally  engendered  the  idea  that 
to  give  up  a  sword  was  an  act  implying  defeat,  bondage,  and 
disgrace ;  and  by  a  not  incomprehensible  extension  of  opinion, 
its  possession  was  counted  as  indicating  the  exact  contrary  of 
all  this,  as  constituting  evidence  that  its  wearer  was  un- 
degraded  and  free,  as  supplying  an  unquestioned  certificate  of 
his  liberty.  It  was  the  visible  badge  of  birth,  of  bravery, 
of  freedom.  No  other  material  object  ever  attained"  such  a 
place  in  the  eyes  of  men  ;  the  sword  stood  absolutely  alone  in 
its  honor-bestowing  efficacy.  The  crown,  the  scepter,  and 
the  robe  of  ermine  were  for  the  elect  alone — even  the  spur 
was  only  for  a  narrow  class ;  but  the  sword  was  for  large  num- 
bers at  once,  and  it  made  no  distinctions  between  its  holders, 
— it  treated  them  all  alike,  and  rendered  precisely  the  same 
service  to  each  of  them.  This  enormous  power  was,  however, 
of  slow  growth.  This  highest  of  the  attributes  of  the  sword, 
this  noblest  of  its  privileges,  was,  after  all,  almost  modern  ; 
the  earth  got  on  without  it  for  long  ages.  The  Greeks  and 
Romans  (who  only  handled  swords  in  war,  and  discarded  them 
^in  peace  time)  knew  naught  about  it ;  they  contemptuously 
scoffed,  indeed,  at  the  barbarians,  their  neighbors,  for  carrying 
•weapons  when  they  did  not  want  them,  and  saw  therein  con- 
clusive evidence  of  their  savage ness.  It  was  not  until  a  state 
of  life  was  reached  in  which  almost  every  man  bore  arms  as 
a  distinction,  until  the  sword  became  a  daily  and  cherished 
companion,  that  its  value  as  a  mark  of  personal  position  stood 
out  complete.  But  when  it  did,  at  last,  attain  the  faculty  of 
bestowing  repute  on  all  who  touched  it,  it  added  a  new  and 
special  glory  to  its  previous  splendors.  Its  legendary,  his- 
torical, and  political  aspects,  which  were  all  stately  enough 
already,  became  supplemented  by  another  and  a  still  higher 
phase. 

Arid  so  the  sword  went  forward,  noble  and  ennobling,  until 


468  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.     . 

another  totally  new  life  began  for  it  with  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury. Until  that  period  it  continued  to  be  the  vehicle  of 
honor  and  of  blows ;  cleaving,  slashing,  mangling,  and  making 
gentlemen,  were  its  perpetual  occupations  ;  and  very  grand 
they  were — so  grand,  indeed,  that  they  would  have  sufficed 
for  any  other  lesser  ambition.  But  the  sword  was  not  con- 
tent ;  it  wanted  more.  Before  it  died  it  seized  a  new  and  still 
more  wonderful  position.  There  came  a  day  when  it  assumed 
another  function,  acquired  another  potentiality,  and  claimed 
another  place.  Radiant  as  had  been  the  sparkling  brilliancies 
which  light  up  its  regal  history,  a  still  brighter  effulgence 
suddenly  illuminated  it  about  the  time  of  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella.  That  glorious  epoch,  so  full  of  dates  and  memories, 
was  the  starting-point  of  further  splendors  which  the  sword» 
with  all  its  accumulated  majesty,  had  not  yet  known.  In 
Spain,  four  hundred  years  ago,  it  was  converted  from  a  weapon 
of  pure  attack  into  a  mixed  arm  of  offense  and  defense  com- 
bined. In  contradiction  to  all  its  previous  usages  and  aspects 
— ^which  had  been  exclusively  aggressive — it  burst  forth  with 
a  new  complexion,  and  became  a  protector  as  well  as  an 
assailant.  It  remained  the  sword,  but  it  replaced  the  shield  ; 
it  lost  no  atom  of  its  ancient  powers,  but  it  added  to  them 
new  ones,  which,  so  far,  no  one  had  suspected  it  of  possessing. 
It  unexpectedly  duplicated  its  operations ;  it  went  on  being 
itself,  but  it  simultaneously  became  its  contrary.  Never  did 
the  nature  of  things  protest  more  strangely  against  its  own 
essence.  The  destroyer  set  itself  to  save,  the  slayer  to  rescue. 
The  sword  had  always  possessed  the  cut  and  thrust ;  it  ob- 
tained the  guard  and  parry.    Fencing  was  invented ! 

Fencing  could  have  had  no  possible  existence  while  buck- 
lers were  alive.  It  was,  equally,  an  impracticability  while 
armor  was  employed.  But,  when  the  aegis  and  the  coat  of 
mail  had  disappeared  together — ^when  the  road  was  opened, 
without  barriers,  to  each  man's  skin — ^when  the  ponderous 
glaives  that  hewed  heavily  through  casque  and  cuirass  had 


THE  SWORD.  469 

lost  the  reason  of  their  being, — then  the  long  thin  coutille  of 
the  Germans — a  prodding  utensil,  originally  devised  to  find 
out  holes  in  breastplates — was  seized  by  the  lithe  ready  hand 
of  Spain,  and  swordsmanship  was.  In  the  first  shape  of  the 
new  invention  the  memory  of  the  shield  was  too  vivacious 
to  be  effaced ;  the  rolled-up  cloak  upon  the  left  arm  supple- 
mented the  action  of  the  blade,  and  comforted  the  combatant 
by  the  notion  that  he  was  behind  a  fortification.  But  this 
subterfuge  died  out,  and  the  true  fence  o(  open  onset  and 
unaided  ward  appeared  upon  the  earth,  alone.  The  soldiers 
of  Charles  the  Fifth  carried  the  new  science  into  Italy,  where 
it  was  taken  up  with  wild  enthusiasm,  and  where  it  found  its 
ablest  professors.  Profoundly  Spanish  in  its  origin  and  lan- 
g-uage,  fencing  became  Italian  in  its  teaching.  "  The  great 
Tappa  of  Milan,"  as  Brantome  calls  him,  was  its  first  famous 
expositor;  and  the  first  scientific  treatise  on  it,  the  well- 
known  "Arte  degli  armi,"  was  published  by  Marozzo  at 
Venice  in  1536.  The  craft  of  swordsmanship  dashed  into  life, 
instantly  great,  suddenly  magnificent — it  stood  abruptly  be- 
fore the  world,  as  real  an  art  as  cookery  or  hairdressing.  And 
then  began  the  superbest  moments  of  the  course  of  the 
sword.  Its  noble  day  had  fully  come.  The  earth  went  mad 
about  fence — as  mad,  almost,  as  if  it  had  been  a  tulip,  a  furbe- 
low, or  a  wig.  And  then  it  turned  French  (as  many  other 
fashions  have  done,  before  and  since).  When  Louis  Treize 
■was  king — when  the  Mousquetaires  fought  hourly  duels  in 
the  Pre  aux:  Clercs — ^when  Athos  and  D'Artagnan  (who  hap- 
pened on  that  occasion  to  be  on  opposite  sides  without 
knowing  it)  recognized  each  other  in  an  accidental  set-to  on 
a  pitch-dark  night,  by  the  manner  of  their  swording, — then, 
most  undeniably,  France  had  grown  to  be  the  mistress  of  this 
new  cunning,  and  thenceforth  her  thirty-two-inch  blade  be- 
came the  adopted  combat-weapon  of  all  gentlemen. 

The  sword  at  that  moment  reached  its  highest.    The  hand- 
ling- of  it  was  a  process  by  itself ;  nothing  like  it  had  been 


470  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

known  before;  it  was  of  its  own  day  and  of  no  other.  Of 
course,  the  method  of  employing  swords  had  always  varied 
with  their  shape  and  size ;  of  course,  the  long  swinging  of  the 
two-handed  claymore  was  distinct  from  the  short  chopping  of 
the  Greeks  ;  of  course,  the  fantastic  flourishing  of  the  scimi- 
tar was  other  than  the  straight  stabbing  of  the  dagger ;  but 
the  rapid  lunging  of  the  rapier,  and  the  complicated  double' 
action  of  the  sword  and  poniard,  were  absolutely  new  shapes 
of  procedure,  involving,  for  the  first  time,  theories, principles 
and  rules.  Thereon  steel  rose  to  its  pinnacle;  it  reached  its 
triumph  ;  it  attained  its  consummation.  Its  fall  has  been  all 
the  more  immense.  Its  ruin  has  been  more  especially  com- 
pletti  by  reason  of  the  very  greatness  of  its  fortune. 

The  vastness  of  its  adversity  would  alone  suffice  to  prevent 
our  forgetting  the  sword  ;  but  we  have  additional  motives  of 
memory,  for  its  suppression  has  brought  about  a  severance  of 
a  very  particular  kind  between  the  present  and  the  past,  and 
has  produced  a  gap  that  nothing  can  fill  up.  Other  ancient 
engines  have  disappeared,  and  none  but  archaeologists  have 
sought  for  their  traces ;  other  venerable  usages  have  melted 
away^  and  the  world  has  gone  on  as  if  they  had  never  existed  ; 
other  antique  fashions  have  died  out,  and  no  one  has  wept 
over  them  ; — but  the  sword  has  left  a  staring  vacancy  behind 
it ;  its  place  remains  untenanted ;  its  functions  are  discharged 
by  na  successor.  Its  overthrow  has  entailed  such  vast  and 
varied  consequences,  that  it  may  really  be  counted,  without 
exaggeration,  amongst  the  events  which  have  palpably  af- 
fected and  directed '  the  destinies  of  humanity.  Its  effects 
have  been  felt  in  every  land  and  every  home  ;  for  the  disaj>- 
pearance  of  the  sword  has  radically  transformed  the  character 
of  war,  and  has  largely  modified  the  character  of  men.  The 
sword  was  not  a  mere  momentary  weapon,  like  a  catapult  or  a 
crossbow;  it  was  not  a  passing  custom,  like  breaking  on  the 
wheel  or  keeping  a  jester ;  it  was  not  an  accidental  style,  like 
wearing  masks  or  building  pyramids.    It  was  an  essence^  a 


I 

J 


THE  SWORD,  471 

fact,  a  part  of  existence,  a  world's  need;  it  outlived  nations 
and  centuries ;  in  endured  when  all  else  changed  around  it. 
And  yet  it  was  not  always  the  same  thing-- it  varied  largely 
with  time  and  place ;  it  made  itself  everything  to  everybody. 

The  discarding  of  this  universal,  indispensable,  and  per- 
petual weapon  has  brought  about  a  transformation  of  two 
distinct  kinds  in  the  features  of  European  war.  Its  material 
result  has  been  the  almost  total  abolition  of  hand-to-hand 
hitting ;  its  moral  outgrowth  has  been  to  change  the  nature 
of  the  courage  which  is  required  in  soldiers,  and  to  give  a 
new  form  to  the  manifestations  of  that  courage.  With  the 
exception  of  such  cavalry  charges  and  of  such  infantry  rushes 
as  result  in  a  melee  (and  they  are  growing  rare  in  the  actions 
of  to-day),  there  is  an  end  in  Europe  of  close  quarters,  and  of 
the  savage  tussles  which  formerly  made  up  almost  the  whole 
of  a  battle.  Instead  of  deUvering  his  stroke  with  his  own 
arm,  and  within  the  reach  of  his  arm,  the  soldier  now  trans- 
mits his  blow  through  the  barrel  of  his  gun,  to  a  distance  of 
a  mile  or  two ;  instead  of  demolishing  a  personal  antagonist, 
whose  eyes  are  glittering  at  him  two  feet  off,  he  knocks  over 
an  indifferent  stranger  out  of  sight.  Strength,  activity,  and 
hard  hitting  are  replaced  by  skill  in  shooting  straight  and  in 
keeping  under  cover.  Shelter-trenches  have  replaced  single 
combat.  Smart  fighting  consists  now  in  slaughtering  people 
you  cannot  see,  and  to  whom  you  are  yourself  invisible :  you 
lie  down  in  a  hole  and  aim  at  a  puff  of  smoke  somewhere  in 
front,  and  try  to  detect  the  consequences  through  a  field- 
glass.  Whirling  a  two-handed  claymore  was  less  scientific 
ithan  this,  but  it  was  decidedly  more  immediate  and  more  per- 
sonal. And  furthermore,  it  was  infinitely  more  murderous, 
which  was  a  merit,  inasmuch  as  the  object  of  war  is  to  slay. 
When  armies  got  face  to  face,  and  man  to  man,  they  ham- 
mered at  each  other  until  scarcely  anybody  was  left;  as  is 
distinctly  proved  by  the  tremendous  proportions  of  killed 
^nd  wounded  reported  from  the  combats  of  the  middle  ages. 


472  THE  UBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

At  Poictiers,  for  instance,  Charles  Martel  is  said  to  have  slain 
375,000  Saracens.  The  suppression  of  swords  has  certainly- 
rendered  warfare  a  good  deal  less  destructive  than  it  was ;  and 
it  has  also  considerably  affected  the  nature  of  wounds  ;  but  it 
is  by  no  means  sure  that  the  world  has  really  derived  any  ad- 
vantage from  that.  It  is  possible,  indeed,  that  we  should  gain 
immensely  in  the  long-run  by  augmenting  the  abominations 
of  war  instead  of  diminishing  them  ;  by  rendering  them  so 
insupportably  hideous,  that  nobody  would  consent  to  face 
them.  If  it  were  made  a  certainty,  beforehand,  that  ever}-*^ 
fight  would  end,  necessarily  on  both  sides,  with  the  massacre 
of  every  man  engaged,  fights  would  probably  become  more 
rare.  Instead  of  that  we  are  going  directly  the  other  way, 
and  are  introducing  a  sort  of  affected  gentleness  into  war  ;  we 
are  pretending  to  make  it  a  matter  of  cleverness  instead  of 
murder,^  by  which  we  are  incontestably  corrupting  its  real 
nature  and  distorting  its  true  position  in  sociology.  War 
means  butchery,  and  nothing  else ;  and  the  more  butchery- 
there  is,  the  more  does  war  present  itself  in  its  own  character, 
and  the  less  disguise  and  sham  is  there  about  it.  The  sword 
was  straight-forward  and  ingenuous ;  every  blow  was  meant 
to  hack  flesh  somewhere ;  it  was  all  in  earnest ;  it  was  all 
savage,  brutal,  and  monstrous ;  it  was  all  blood,  and  mutila- 
tion, and  horror ;  it  meant  all  it  did,  and  had  no  shame  about 
it.  But  the  theories  and  the  processes  of  to-day  are  of  an- 
other sort ;  they  have  none  of  the  simplicity  and  none  of  the 
frank  honesty  of  the  sword.  Strategy  (which  means  strata- 
gem) has  assumed  the  place  of  strength  and  struggling.  The 
object  of  a  campaign  is  to  take  the  other  people  prisoners 
rather  than  to  kill  them.  Little  linesmen,  who  weigh  nine 
stone,  are  fancied  to  be  more  fit  for  soldiering  than  brawny 
giants  are,  because  they  have  less  weight  to  carry  on  a  march, 
and  can  be  more  easily  hidden  away  in  a  furrow  or  behind  a 
bush.  Physical  power  is  no  longer  indispensable,  for  there 
*e  scarcely  any  occasions  in  which  it  can  be  used. 


THE  SWORD,  47S 

But  these  transformations  in  the  nature  of  war,  great 
though  they  be,  are  even  less  striking  than  the  immense 
changes  which  have  come  about  in  the  composition  and  the 
demonstration  of  modern  military  courage.  We  all  well  know 
what  bravery  used  to  be.  In  the  days  of  steel  the  soldier  very 
soon  got  up  to  his  enemy,  and  went  at  him  in  person.  The 
employment  of  distant  arms,  whether  they  were  slings,  or 
javelins,  or  arrows,  did  not  keep  armies  long  apart ;  they  got 
together  and  battered  etich  other.  The  sort  of  valor  required 
for  such  fighting  as  that  was  of  a  very  elementary  and  com- 
mon sort;  no  training,  no  obedience,  no  discipline,  no  exam- 
ple, were  required  to  lead  a  man  to  corftbat  when  he  was  in 
personal  danger,  when  his  life  depended  on  his  own  stoutness, 
and  when  he  would  be  killed  at  once  if  he  did  not  use  his 
weapon  to  protect  himself.  And  furthermore,  he  had  the 
stimulus  of  physical  exertion,  of  active  effort  and  strife,  of 
passion  and  conflict.  His  blood  was  up,  and  all  his  senses 
were  concentrated  on  attack.  He  had  no  time  to  be  afraid, 
and  his  entire  case,  corporeal  and  mental,  was  opposed  to  run- 
ning away.  In  such  a  condition  ferocity  came  of  itself ;  it  was 
an  unavoidable,'  self-born  result  of  the  situation  ;  all  the  aids 
to  it  were  collected  round  the  fighting  man  ;  all  its  sources 
were  present  in  him,  hard  at  work ;  he  combated  in  battle  as 
naturally  as  he  would  eat  at  table.  There  was  no  high  cour- 
age in  his  doings,  as  we  understand  courage  now. 

The  pluck  that  we  ask  from  our  soldiers  to-day  is  of  a  very 
different  sort.  It  is  indeed  so  infinitely  other  and  so  infinitely 
higher  that  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  make  a  serious  compari- 
son between  the  old  and  the  new  shapes  of  valiance.  The 
invention  of  long-range  fighting  has  brought  into  the  world 
a  type  of  fortitude  which  has  been  hitherto  totally  unknown 
(excepting  in  occasional  isolated  cases),  which  is  just  as  much 
a  product  of  our  century  as  railways  or  electric  telegraphs, 
and  which  is  as  distinguishable  from  the  animal  courage  re- 
quired for  sword-work  as  is  prophecy  from  fortune-telling. 


474  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.     " 

Instead  of  dashing  at  the  enemy  in  fierce  excitement,  instead 
of  the  hot  emotion  of  savage  struggle,  instead  of  furious 
muscular  exasperation,  instead  of  the  intensest  development 
of  the  combative  faculties,  our  soldiers  have  now  to  exhibit 
their  intrepidity*  by  remaining  placid,  motionless,  undisturbed, 
amidst  a  hail  of  death  and  wounds.  They  have  to  stay  quiet 
under  distant  fire,  to  let  themselves  be  knocked  to  pieces, 
without  the  chance  or  even  the  possibility  of  doing  anything- 
whatever  to  defend  themselves  in  an  eager,  efiicient,  satisfy- 
ing form ;  the  one  solution  open  to  them  is  to  treat  the  other 
people  in  the  same  fashion,  and  to  pelt  impersonal  missiles 
at  them  from  afar.  Not  a  man  on  either  side  has  the  pleasure 
of  identifying  the  particular  opponent  who  slaughters  him. 
There  is  scarcely  any  of  that  individuality  of  carnage  which  is 
so  contenting  in  hand-to-hand  fight.  And  worse  than  all, 
there  is  none  of  the  output  of  effort,  of  the  bitter  strain  which 
necessarily  accompanies  the  exhibition  of  brute  hardihood.  The 
braveiy  of  to-day  is  a  nervous  contemplative  process  ;  there  is 
no  action,  no  movement,  no  tug  about  it.  It  principally  consists 
in  waiting  obediently  until  you  are  hit  by  a  chance  shot.  Troops 
do  not  like  it.  They  are  always  wanting  to  get  out  of  it,  to  rush 
ahead,  to  strike,  to  do  something  violent  and  comforting-  on 
their  own  behalf.  They  feel  that  it  is  absolutely  unnatural  to 
stand  still  to  be  killed,  that  it  is  totally  anomalous  to  rest  unag- 
gressive under  a  tempest  of  ambient  peril,  that  it  is  contrary' 
to  all  the  tendencies  of  humanity  to  make  no  vigorous  at- 
tempt to  ward  off  destruction  ;  and  yet  that  is  precisely  what 
they  have  learned  to  do.  They  may  use  shelter  if  they  can 
find  it  (it  is  no  longer  cowardly  to  hide),  but  they  may  not  use 
action.  In  one  of  Raffet's  caricatures,  a  regiment  is  halted  in " 
the  middle  of  a  river,  with  the  water  up  to  the  men's  netks: 
the  colonel  says  to  them,  "My  children,  I  forbid  you  to  smoke, 
but  I  permit  you  to  sit  down ;"  and  that  is  very  much  the 
situation  in  which  European  soldiers  are  placed  in  battle  now; 
it  is  permitted  to  be  killed,  but  it  is  forbidden  to  fight.    In 


THE  SWORD.  475 

Asia,  it  is  true,  there  is  still  a  chance  of  getting  to  close  quar- 
ters and  of  using  the  right  arm,  as  a  good  many  of  our  people 
who  have  been  in  Afghanistan  can  testify.  But  in  modern 
fighting  on  the  Continent  the  rule  is  that  the  foe  is  so  far  off 
that  no  hitting  can  reach  him.  The  consequence  is,  that  our 
new  shape  of  courage  is  based  on  the  suppression  of  direct 
effort ;  it  has  become  a  passive  process,  in  which  we  endure 
instead  of  acting.  The  old  sword-daring  was  impetuous, 
emotional,  and  intuitive  ;  the  new  gun-courage  is  deliberate, 
logical,  and  subjective  ;  the  one  was  material  and  substantial, 
the  other  is  abstract  and  theoretical.  They  are  as  different 
from  each  other  as  credulity  and  faith,  as  astrology  and 
astronomy,  as  dreams  and  thought. 

N9W,  how  has  this  strange  transformation  come  about  .^ 
Where  lies  its  root }  Can  it  really  be  that  it  is  solely  because 
soldiers  go  to  battle  now  with  guns  instead  of  swords,  that  this 
prodigious  change  in  the  character  of  bravery  has  grown  up  ? 
Or  is  there  another  qause  for  it  besides  that  one  ?  The  ans- 
wers to  these  questions  are  not  difficult  to  find.  The  influence 
of  sword  or  gun  is,  certainly,  at  the  bottom  of  them,  but  an- 
other and  a  greater  action  overlies  it.  The  use  of  the  sword 
was  essentially  personal ;  while  the  use  of  the  gun  is,  as  es- 
sentially, impersonal.  The  sword  was  the  expression  of  the 
individual  man  who  fought  with  it ;  the  gun  is  a  machine. 
Each  sword  had  its  own  special  manner  of  operating,  its  own 
particular  method,  according  to  the  hand  which  held  it ;  while 
each  gun  is  but  one  in  a  total.  The  sword  could  not  be 
wielded  without  liberty ;  the  gun  cannot  be  worked  without 
system.  The  one  means  independence,  the  other  means  dis- 
cipline ;  and  there — in  that  last  word — is  found  the  true  secret 
of  modern  courage.  The  swordsman  was  himself  alone,  there- 
fore his  qualities  were  positive ;  the  shooter  is  a  unit  in  a 
regiment,  therefore  his  qualities  must  be  negative.  We  see 
proof  enough  of  that  at  every  match.  The  men  who  win 
prizes  are  precisel)'"  those  who  are  animated  by  the  least  emo- 


4/6  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA GAZINE. 

tion,  who  have  reduced  themselves  the  most  completely  to 
a  condition  of  impassibility.  The  difference  between  the 
swordsman  and  the  rifleman  is  as  great  as  between  the  Japanese 
workman,  who  never  reproduces  the  same  pattern  twice,  but 
throws  a  fresh  invention  of  his  own  into  every  object  he 
fashions,  and  the  Birmingham  artisan,  who  goes  on  me- 
chanically making  the  one  same  identical  spoon  or  tray 
throughout  his  life.  And  yet,  though  the  independence  of 
the  sword  is,  manifestly,  a  more  intellectual  condition  than  the 
discipline  of  the  gun,  it  is  discipline,  not  independence,  which 
has  generated  the  loftiest  type  of  courage  that  the  world  has 
seen.  It  is  discipline  alone  which  has  popularized  coolness, 
by  enabling  entire  armies  to  acquire  and  practice  it.  Single 
examples  of  it  have  existed  since  history  began ;  but  it  is  in 
our  day  that,  for  the  first  time,  hundreds  of  thousands  of  men 
exhibited  stoicism  together.  There  lies  the  reply  to  our 
questions.  The  actual  shape  of  military  courage  is  the  fruit 
of  a  particular  training,  which  has  suppressed  the  importance 
of  the  parts  by  transferring  it  to  the  whole.  That  trainings 
was  unattainable  while  the  sword  forced  fighters  to  be  in- 
dividual. It  has  only  become  achievable  since  the  gun  has 
obliged  soldiers  to  be  collective.  Here,  at  last,  is  a  point  on 
which  the  sword  has  to  confess  itself  beaten. 

But  if  it  has  to  admit  its  inferiority  as  regards  the  quality  of 
the  courage  which  it  provoked,  it  rushes  to  the  front  again 
directly  we  try  to  measure  the  influence  it  exercised  on 
character.  The  gun  has  done  nothing,  absolutely  nothing,  to 
develop  either  qualities  or  defects  in  man.  The  peculiar  new 
shape  of  bravery  which  has  accompanied  its  adoption  in  war, 
is  due,  after  all,  to  no  merit  in  the  gun  itself ;  it  is  simply  an 
additional  example,  evolved  by  circumstances,  of  that  pro- 
gressive substitution  of  the  idea  of  duty  for  the  idea  of  honor, 
which  constitutes  so  vivid  and  so  absolute  a  distinction  be- 
tween the  motives  and  the  objects  of  the  past  and  of  the 
present.    The  gun  has  in  no  way  aided  us  to  form  our  tem- 


t' 


THE  SWOR]?,  A77 

t 

peraments,  our  dispositions,  our  desires,  or  our  capacities  ;  its 
action  on  us,  as  a  molder  of  our  natures,  has  been  null.  But 
the  sword,  on  the  contrar5^  has  been  one  of  the  most  powerful 
of  the  factors  which  have  contributed  to  shape  the  tenor  of 
men,  both  in  body  and  in  mind.  The  work  it  did  is  self- 
evident  :  it  stares  us  in  the  face.  Its  operation  was  so  direct, 
so  immediate,  so  personal — it  went  so  straight  to  its  end — 
there  was  such  a  total  absence  of  hesitation  or  of  complexity 
about  it — that  it  would  indeed  have  been  astonishing  if  it  had 
produced  a  less  vast  result.  Of  course  the  manner  and  the 
quantity  of  its  action  have  varied  largely  with  time  and  place ; 
but  that  action  was,  in  general  terms,  constant,  until  a  century 
ag"o.  Everywhere  and  always  the  usage  of  the  sword  has 
told,  for  evil  and  for  good,  upon  a  large  proportion  of  man- 
kind. Physically,  its  work  was  excellent ,  it  stimulated  ac- 
tivity, strength,  rapidity  of  movement,  dexterity  and  certainty 
of  hand  and  foot.  Morally,  its  doings  were  opposite  and  con- 
flicting. In  one  direction  it  engendered  self-reliance,  the 
habit  of  resource,  the  consciousness  of  responsibility  ;  a  keen 
sentiment  of  dignity,  of  loyalty  and  of  honor ;  the  desire  to 
protect  the  suffering  and  the  weak  ;  and  a  curious,  fantastic, 
very  noble  generosity,  proper  to  itself  alone,  which  stands 
before  us  in  history  under  the  misty  name  of  "the  spirit  of 
chivalry"; — but  in  its  other  bearings,  it  bred  irritability, 
bullying,  provocation,  violence,  the  vain  glory  of  force.  In  all 
these  resultances,  however,  composite  and  even  contradic- 
tory as  they  were  between  themselves,  the  sword  invariably 
maintained,  unchanged  and  unchangeable,  the  great  striking 
characteristic  of  its  form  of  proceeding — it  was  uniformly  and 
persistently  personal.  It  acted  on  each  man  separately;  it 
guided  one  to  the  right,  another  to  the  left.  Never  did  it 
proceed  by  groups ;  the  absolute  individuality  of  its  teaching 
was  the  most  remarkable  of  the  many  features  it  presented. 
It  was  a  private  tutor,  not  a  schoolmaster. 
Well,  this  energetic  educator  has  been  suppressed.     Its 


47^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

■%  ._ 

peculiar  lessons  have  ceased  to  act  upon  us  ;  the  influence  it 
exerted  has  vanished ;  it  no  longer  prompts  us  to  good,  or 
pushes  to  evil.  We  have  become  free  to  act  as  we  like,  with- 
out any  of  the  guidance  which,  during  centuries,  the  sword 
imposed  on  Europeans.  Have  we  lost,  or  have  we  gained,  by 
the  cessation  of  that  guidance  ?  The  majority  of  us  would 
probably  declare  that  we  have  largely  gained  :  that  the  sword 
was  a  blusterer,  a  bully,  and  a  tyrant ;  that  an  incubus  has 
been  lifted  off  our  backs ;  that  we  have  escaped  from  a  dom- 
ination and  a  cruelty ;  and  that  we  are  well  rid  of  the  intim- 
idation of  steel.  But  a  minority  would  perhaps  proclaim  that 
the  sword  performed  a  moral  function,  and  exercised  a  social 
action  ;  that  it  was  not  a  mere  swaggerer,  a  mere  despot,  or  a 
mere  killer ;  that  it  did  service  upon  earth  by  forcing  men  to 
respect  each  other ;  that  it  kept  up  the  sentiment  of  mutual 
responsibility  as  no  other  external  agent  has  ever  sustained 
it.  Some  of  us  might  indeed  go  further  still,  and  assert  that, 
^  since  the  downfall  of  the  sword,  the  notion  and  the  practice 
of  deference  of  manners  between  man  and  man  have  palpably 
diminished ;  that  the  conception  of  honor  has  grown  distinct- 
ly feebler;  that  an  undeniable  development  of  the  meaner 
instincts  has  supervened;  and  that,  if  hectoring  and  violence 
have  decreased  on  the  one  hand,  punctiliousness,  courtesy, 
dignity,  and  fair  name,  have  still  more  ebbed  away  on  the 
other.  And  all  this  may  be  said  without  the  slightest  desire 
to  defend  duelling.  It  is  the  abstract  idea  of  the  sword,  not 
the  practical  misuse  of  it,  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  such 
thoughts  as  these.  The  sword,  with  all  its  faults,  was  a  gallant 
gentleman  ;  and  there  is  neither  folly  nor  exaggeration  in 
maintaining  that,  when  a  just  balance-sheet  is  struck,  the 
world  comes  out  a  loser,  not  a  winner,  by  its  discomfiture. 

All  this,  however,  is  only  the  moral  and  sentimental  aspect 
of  the  subject.  It  has  a  material  side  as  well,  which,  though 
it  is  far  less  interesting,  would  form  an  even  bigger  partx>f  it 
if  it  were  set  forth  in  its  full  proportions.    Its  dimensions^are 


THE  SWORD.  479 

indeed  enormous.      Never  has  any  manufactured  product 
exhibited  more  elastically  than  the  sword  the  faculty  of  adapt- 
ing- itself  to  circumstances ;  even  clothes  have  scarcely  been 
more  multiform,  even  houses  have  hardly  been  more  sundry. 
The  sword  has  been  made  of  many  sorts  of  matters  and  metals  : 
of  stone,  of  wood,  of  bone,  of  copper,  of  brass,  of  bronze,  of 
iron.     It  has  assumed  deviating  shapes  and  profuse  sizes ;  it 
has  been  short  and  long,  heavy  and  light,  straight  and  curved, 
wide  and  narrow,  pointed,  round,  or  square,  tapering  or  expand- 
ing-, sharp  on  either  side,  or  on  both,  or  on  neither.     There 
have  been,  in  each  European  language,  at  least  thirty  different 
names  of  breeds  of  swords, — from  the  horseman's  huge  espa- 
don  of  six  feet  long,  to  the  garter  stylet  of  six  inches.    The 
catalogues  of  armories,  and  the  special  books  on  weapons,  con- 
tain so  many  details,  so  many  descriptions,  and  so  many  dis- 
tinctions of  types  and  sects  and  characters,  that  no  enthusiast 
can  pretend  to  know  them  all.     Specimens  have  come  to  us 
from  all  the  hiding-places  and  all  the  countries,  from  tombs 
and  caves  and  river-beds  and  ruins,  from  under  ground  and 
under  marsh  and  under  water,  from  Mexico  and  Persia,  from 
Scandinavia  and  Japan,  from  ancient  Dacia  and  Peru,  from 
Africa  and  China,  from  Rome,  Assyria,  and  Ireland,  from  Switz- 
erland and  Denmark,  from  Germany  and  Sicily,  from  every- 
where and  anywhere,  and  other  places.    The  earth,  the  lake, 
and  the  stream  have  disgorged  their  swallowed  specimens ; 
the  sepulcher  and  the  temple  have  given  back  their  offerings ; 
the  buried  city  has  unclutched  its  relics ;  the  battle  field  has 
rendered  up  its  vestiges.    And  from  all  these  subterranean 
pillagings  tlie  museums  have  grown  full.    There  is  the  Greek 
sword,  so  curt  that  it  was  little  more  than  a  large  knife,  pre- 
eminently fit  for  scrambling,  hacking,  strenuous  stabbing  at 
unflinchingly  close  quarters.    There  is  the  Roman  sword,  of 
differing  lengths,  almost  as  various,  indeed,  as  the  countries 
it  conquered.    There  is  the  Gallic  sword,  of  such  soft  pliant 
metal  that  its  users  had  to  stop  in  fight,  after  each  hard  blow. 


48o  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZINE7 

in  order  to  straighten  it  under  their  feet,  thereby  enabling  the 
enemy  to  Icnock  them  over  uncontestedly.  There  are  the 
hooked  scimitars  of  the  Turks,  with  an  inside  edge,  and  the 
curved  Arab  yataghans,  with  the  edge  outsidb.  There  is  the 
cross-handled  sword  of  the  Crusader,  with  which  he  prayed 
and  slew  alternately.  There  is  the  weapon  whose  pommel 
served  for  a  seal,  like  that  of  Charlemagne,  who  said,  when 
he  used  it  to  put  his  stamp  on  treaties,  "  I  sign  them  with 
this  end,  and  with  the  other  I  will  take  care  that  they  are 
kept."  There  are  Dutch,  Russian,  Portuguese,  and  Moorish 
swords,  each  one  of  them  with  a  type  or  detail  proper  to  itself. 
There  are  the  glaives  of  red-clothed  headsmen  of  the  middle 
ages;  there  are  Malay  krisses,  and  the  notched  blades  of  Zan- 
zibar, and  old  sabers  (the  parents  of  our  contemporaneous 
tribe)  from  India,  Armenia,  and  Khorasan.  There  is  the 
espada  of  the  Spanish  matador,  the  schiavona  of  Venice,  the 
Albanian  cutlass,  the  Kabyle  fiissa,  the  Turkish  kandjar,  the 
court  sword  of  a  century  ago,  the  claymore  of  Scotland. 
There  are  all  the  incalculable  assortments  of  German,  Spanish, 
and  Italian  swords.  All  these,  and  a  thousand  others,  are  to 
be  found  in  the  collections,  with  their  capricious  varyings  of 
blade  and  handle,  of  pommel,  spindle,  and  hilt,  of  inlaying 
and  engraving,  of  complicated  basket-guards,  of  every  sort 
of  ornament  and  complement  and  supplement  that  can  be 
added  to  an  implement.  Damaskeening,  particularly  (which 
is  the  incrusting  of  gold  and  silver  into  iron  and  steel,  and 
which,  though  said  by  Heroditus  to  have  been  invented  by 
Glaucus  of  Chio,  and  though  cultivated  by  the  Romans,  was 
not  seriously  practiced  in  modern  Europe  till  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury), gives  a  remarkable  beauty  and  artistic  value  to  many 
swords ;  it  is,  perhaps,  indeed  the  most  distinctive  and  the 
most  graceful  of  all  the  adornments  which  have  been  lavished 
upon  them.  And  the  scabbards !  Why,  they  form  a  special 
race ;  if  they  were  not,  by  the  essence  and  condition  of  their 
being,  a  mere  adjunct  to  something  else,  the?^  would  occupy  a 


i 


THE  SWORD.  ,  481 

place  of  their  own  in  the  world.  Their  sorts  and  shapes  are 
so  many  that  they  are  beyond  arithmetic.  Then  there  are 
inscriptions  on  the  blades.  They  almost  constitute  a  litera- 
ture, in  poetry  and  in  prose.  For  the  most  part  they  are  brag 
and  bluster ;  but  here  and  there  some  few  of  them  are  pious, 
wise,  or  silly.  The  n^ighty  glaive  of  Conrad  Schenk  of  Win- 
terstetten  (4  feet  8  inches  long,  and  4  inches  wide),  which  is 
in  the  Dresden  Museum,  bears,  in  antiquated  German,  the 
tenderly  swaggering  advice — "  Conrad,  dear  Schenk,  remem- 
ber me.  Do  not  let  Winterstetten  the  Brave  leave  one  helm 
uncleft.'*  The  sword  of  Hugues  de  Chateaubriand  flashed  in 
the  sunlight  the  noble  motto  won  by  his  ancestor  in  the  fight 
at  Bouvines,  **  Mon  sang  teint  les  bannieres  de  France."  In 
the  Erbach  Collection  is  an  old  Ferrara  blade,  with  the  sage 
device,  "  My  value  varies  with  the  hand  that  holds  me."  A 
sword  in  the  Paris  Cabinet  de  Medailles,  is  reverently  inscrib- 
ed, "There  is  no  conqueror  but  God."  The  rapiers  of  Toledo 
were  engraved  in  hundreds  with  the  wise  counsel,  "  Do  not 
draw  me  without  reason,  do  not  sheathe  me  without  honor," 
The  invocation  of  saints  are  very  frequent ;  and  so  are  prayers, 
like,  "  Do  not  abandon  me,  O  faithful  God,"  which  is  on  a 
German  sword  in  the  Az  Collection  at  Linz ;  and  ejaculations, 
like  the  Arabic,  "  With  the  help  of  Allah  I  hope  to  kill  my 
enemy."  There  are  vaunting  mottos,  like  the  Spanish,  "  When 
this  viper  stings,  there  is  no  cure  in  any  doctor's  shop ;  "  and 
pompous  announcements,  like  Sicilian,  **  I  come ; "  and  critical 
observations,  like  the  Hungarian,  "  He  that  thinks  not  as  I  do 
thinks  falsely ; "  and  matter-of-fact  declarations,  like,  "  When 
I  go  up  you  go  down  "  (only  that  is  on  an  axe).  This  "  cutler 
poetry,"  as  Shakespeare  called  it,  presents  itself  all  over 
Europe,  in  all  languages,  mixed  up  with  the  maker's  address 
or  the  owner's  arms.  And  so,  if  you  go  to  Toledo  now  and 
buy  a  dozen  blades  for  presentation  to  your  friends  at  home, 
you  have  their  names  engraved  upon  the  steel,  with  some 
sonorous  Castilian  phrase  of  friendship  and  gift-offering. 
L.  M.— 16 


482     ^^^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

As  for  manufacturing  details,  properly  so  called,  they  are 
(with  one  exception)  too  technical  to  be  tallied  of  here ;  they 
interest  nobod)^  but  blacksmiths.  All  that  need  be  said  about 
them  is  that  the  secret  of  a  modern  sword  lies  exclusively  in 
the  tempering,  and  that  almost  each  maker  has  his  own  fash- 
ions and  his  own  tricks.  To  make  steel  sharp,  it  must  be 
hard ;  to  make  it  elastic,  it  must  be  tough.  Cast-steel  gives 
hardness,  shear-steel  gives  toughness,  but  in  no  ordinary  pro- 
cess can  the  two  qualities  be  united.  So,  excepting  at  Toledo 
and  one  or  two  other  places,  all  actual  makers  have  abandoned 
the  attempt  to  produce  elastic  blades,  and  have  gone  in  for' 
edge  alone.  There  is,  however  (or,  more  exactly,  there  was), 
a  treatment  which  really  does  unite  the  two  contrary  capacities 
in  the  same  blade.  The  curious"  product  called  damask-steel 
possesses  them  both,  and  all  the  great  Eastern  swords  owe  to 
it  their  celebrity.  It  is  true  that  the  art  of  damasking  (which 
is  a  very  different  matter  from  the  damaskeening  alluded  to 
just  now)  has  lost  its  use  since  swords  have  ceased  their  serv- 
ice ;  but  still  it  looms  out  with  such  distinctness  in  the  me- 
chanical part  of  the  history  of  swords,  it  occupies  so  large  a 
place  in  its  atmosphere,  that  it  is  impossible  to  pass  it  over  in 
silence.  It  constitutes  the  exception  which  has  just  been 
mentioned. 

All  steel  which  exhibits  a  surface  figured  with  lines  is  called 
damask,  but  the  true  oriental  product  of  that  name  united 
extraordinary  interior  qualities  to  this  generic  exterior  aspect. 
It  combined  two  distinct  classes  of  merit.  First,  as  regards  its 
inner  nature,  it  was  so  ductile  and  so  malleable  that  it  could  be 
hammered  cold ;  yet  it  became  "  as  hard  as  tyranny  "  when 
tempered,  and  took  an  edge  as  sharp  as  the  north  wind ;  and, 
with  all  this,  was  as  supple  as  whalebone,  so  that  no  accident 
could  break  it.  Secondly,  as  regards  its  external  appearance, 
it  was  covered  with  meandering  lines  like  water-marks ;  its 
hue  was  gray,  brown,  or  black,  and  presented,  over  all,  a 
varying  sheen,  blue,  red,  or  golden.    The  quality  rose  with  the , 


THE  SWORD,     -  483 

size,  the  shape,  and  the  clearness  of  the  Hnes.  In  very  high- 
class  specimens  they  were  an  eighth  of  an  inch  thick ;  when 
they  were  only  as  wide  ordinary  writing  they  were  not  re- 
garded as  really  good  ;  and  if  they  were  scarcely  visible  they 
they  were  altogether  contemptible.  Pattern  was  as  impor- 
tant as  size ;  straight  parallel  ribs  constituted'the  lowest  type  ; 
as  the  lines  curved  the  merit  rose ;  it  went  on  increasing 
with  the  multiplicity  of  twist ;  it  became  admirable  when 
ruptures  of  the  marks  appeared,  with  dots  between  them  ;  it 
was  distinctly  noble  when  the  lines  were  so  contorted  and  so 
broken  that  they  formed  a  network  of  little  threads,  twisteji 
in  different  directions ;  and  it  attained  its  highest  possible 
perfection  when  those  threads  assumed  the  shape  of  chevrons 
or  of  bunches  of  little  grapes,  spread  equally  all  over  the 
blade.  If,  to  these  particularities  of  pattern,  a  deep,  dark 
ground  with  a  true  golden  gloss  was  superadded,  then  the 
work  was  a  masterpiece,  and  was  worthy  to  have  been  made 
at  Damascus. 

These  definitions  were  laid  down  some  thirty  years  ago  by 
a  man  who  followed  out  the  art  of  damasking  to  its  inmost 
mysteries — who  made  himself  its  apostle,  and  preached  its 
creed.  This  enthusiast — Colonel  Anosoff,  manager  of  the 
imperial  factory  of  Zlatoust  in  the  Urals — succeeded  in  re- 
producing the  true  oriental  damask — at  last  he  obtained  steel 
of  such  striking  character,  and  of  such  beauty  and  merit, 
that  it  was  not  possible  to  detect  any  difference  between  it 
and  the  most  finished  old  Syrian  performances.  The  lines 
vrhich  his  work  showed  were  in  the  metal  itself,  and  could 
not  be  ground  out  of  it ;  his  color  and  prismatic  luster  were 
altogether  perfect ;  and  he  frequently  (not  always)  united  ex- 
treme hardness  and  extreme  elasticity  in  the  same  specimen. 
He  made  some  swords  which  would  bend  till  the  point  touched 
the  hilt,  and  which  would  also  cut  through  an  iron  bar.  More 
than  this,  no  blade  can  do,  or  ever  has  done ;  and  the  same 
two  faculties  have  never  been  conjoined  in  any  other  steel 


484  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

than  damask.  There  are  swords  now  made  in  Europe  which 
will  sweep  a  gauze  in  two  in  the  air;  and  at  Toledo,  every  day, 
blades  may  be  seen  packed  in  coils  like  watch-springs.  But 
no  metal  can  be  persuaded  to  do  both  unless  it  be  damasked, 
and  not  always  even  then. 

To  attain  tHese  results,  Colonel  Anosoff  tried  several  pro- 
cesses of  manufacture,  and  reached  fair  results  with  most  of 
them ;  but  his  best  work  was  effected  by  mixing  pure  native 
graphite  with  the  highest  quality  of  iron,  using  dolomite  as  a 
flux.  A  good  many  minerals  are  known  to  possess  the  prop- 
erty of  damasking  steel,  but  none  of  them  to  the  same  extent 
as  graphite — so  far,  that  is,  as  European  experience  extends. 
It  is,  however,  almost  certain  that  the  great  Asiatic  steels 
were  obtained  by  some  unknown  process  of  mere  tempering, 
without  any  special  mixtures ;  unless,  indeed  Nature  xiid  the 
adulteration  herself;  which  is  possible,  for  Faraday  thought 
he  saw  in  many  Eastern  specimens  faint  traces  of  something 
more  than  pure  iron,  carbon,  and  azote,  which  is  the  com- 
position of  chemically  unsophisticated  steel.  In  the  Indian 
"wootz"  steel,  for  instance,  which  possesses  remarkable 
toughness  and  sharpness,  he  fancied  he  found  aluminium. 
But  no  analysis  of  oriental  swords  has  revealed  any  really 
perceptible  difference  of  ingredients  between  them  and  ordi- 
nary modern  products.  The  water  used  for  cooling  may,  not 
impossibly,  have  had  a  share  in  the  work  ;  for  it  is  well  known 
that  its  particular  character  exercises  a  clearly  recognizable 
influence  on  the  metal  chilled  in  it.  When  the  Toledo  factory 
was  removed  to  Seville,  to  keep  it  out  of  the  hands  of  the 
French  during  the  Peninsular  war,  the  quality  of  the  steel  fell 
instantl5^  and  rose  again  on  the  return  to  Toledo — showing, 
according  to  all  the  judges,  that  the  Guadalquiver  did  its 
business  less  well  than  the  Tagus.  In  the  same  way  the  dyes 
for  the  Gobelin  tapestries  are  said  to  owe  their  infinite  deJi- 
cacy  of  hue  to  the  effect  of  the  Bievre — a  little  stream  which 
is  employed  in  their  preparation  ;  and  the  beer  of  Allsopp  or 


.  THE  SWORD,  4^5 

Bass  to  be  what  it  is  because  it  is  made  of  the  water  of  the 
Trent.  Anyhow,  whatever  may  have  been  its  feshioning  the 
Asiatic  damask-steel  was  far  away  the  best  material  for  swords 
that  the  world  has  ever  seen — for  it  would  cut  through  most 
obstacles,  and  could  be  fractured  by  none. 

Even  the  amazing  sabers  of  Japan,  despite  their  bewilder- 
ing sharpness,  cannot-compete  with  damasked  blades,  because 
they  have  no  elasticity.  They  are  as  hard  as  diamond ;  they 
take  and  keep  an  ^^^o,  so  ideally  acute  that  they  will  go 
through  a  pillow  or  a  poker  as  if  they  were  air.  Mf  you  hold 
them  vertically  in  a  river  the  leaves  that  float  down  with  the 
current  will,  unknowingly,  cut 'themselves  in  two  against 
them ;  they  flick  off  a  man's  head  with  a  twist  of  the  wrist ; 
you  can  shave  with  them ; — at  least  all  this  is  said  of  them, 
and  very  possibly  it  is  true.  But,  stupendously  as  they  cut, 
they  can  do  nothing  else ;  and  they  are  heavy  and  double- 
handled,  and  awkward  to  use  by  foreigners.  In  their  own 
country,  however,  they  have  been  so  cherished  and  so  prized 
that  some  of  them  have  been  deified,  and  have  had  temples 
built  to  them.  It  is  true  that  this  happened  a  long  time  ago, 
when  the  sword,  the  mirror,  and  the  ball  were  still  revered  as 
the  three  treasures  sent  from  heaven  with  the  first  ruler  of 
the  country  in  700  B.  c.  But  though  the  saber  soon  ceased 
to  enjoy  the  advantage  of  becoming  a  god  itself,  it  continued 
always  to  be  regarded  as  a  worthy  offering  to  other  gods, 
which  explains  why  so  many  of  the  finest  specimens  have 
been  preserved  in  the  temples.  Yet,  with  all  this  adoration 
of  them,  the  manufacture  of  swords  developed  slowly  in 
Japan.  Until  the  end  of  the  fifth  century  Chinese  and  Corean 
blades  were  considered  to  be  better  than  the  local  products ; 
and  it  was  only  on  the  creation  of  the  ministry  of  war  in  A.  D. 
645  (has  any  other  land  a  war  office  twelve  centuries  old.^) 
that  a  Government  arms  factory  was  established,  and  a 
stimulus  given  to  the  trade.  From  that  date  it  grew  rapidly. 
The    famous  Yastsuma  invented   new  processes  of  treating 


486  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,  ''• 

Steel ;  and  in  the  eleventh  century  the  Japanese  swx>rds  ex- 
ported to  China  aroused^  such  admiration  that  a  notable  wise 
man  of  the  period  composed  a  poem,  which  is  still  popular,  to 
celebrate  their  merits.  About  the  year  1400,  the  illustrious 
maker,  Yoshimitsu,  and  his  followers,  carried  the  manufacture 
to  the  highest  perfection  it  ever  attained.  From  that  date  it 
progressed  no  further,  but  it  remained  active  and  prosperous, 
because,  as  every  gentleman  wore  two  swords,  the  demand 
was  large  and  constant.  The  destruction  of  the  feudal  system 
by  the  revolution  of  1868  haS  suppressed  swords  in  Japan,  as 
they  had  already  been  uprooted  in  Europe ;  henceforth  those 
wonderful  razors  will  only  be  found  in  museums,  side  by  side 
with  mummies  and  stuffed  birds. 

And  when,  from  the  cold  stand-point  of  those  museums, 
with  all  enthusiasm  chilled  out  of  us  by  catalogues  and  gl^ss 
cases  and  rust,  we  look  back  at  the  career  of  swords  in  their 
totality — when  we  consider  them  as  things  of  the  past  with 
which  we  have  no  longer  any  concern,  excepting  as  curiosi- 
ties— ^we  see  even  more  plainly  than  before  the  main  outlines 
of  thejr  record,  and  the  salient  features  of  their  work.  The 
stages  of  their  history  stand  forth  distinctly ;  the  periods  are 
as  clearly  marked  as  the  rows  of  seats  in  an  amphitheater. 
First  comes  the  pure  carnage  epoch,  elementary  and  ruthless. 
Then  follows  the  legendary  era  of  impossible  feats  of  arms, 
stupendous  and  puerile.  Next  arrives  the  feudal  time,  devout 
and  murderous,  with  its  curious  mixed  processes  of  religion 
and  butchery,  and  the  simultaneous  sentimental  elevation 
of  the  sword  to  the '  sovereign  place  of  fountain  of  honor. 
After  it  springs  up  the  noble  seasons  of  fence,  gymnastic  and 
superb.  And,  finally,  there  is  the  downfall,  sad,  ah  sad! 
Through  these  five  ostensibly  registered  terms  the  sword 
traveled  unceasingly  onwards  and  upwards,  till  it  had  com- 
pleted its  allotted  evolution  and  reached  the  plenitude  of  its 
development.  It  followed  out  its  varying  destiny  to  the  end, 
attaining,  before  it  fell,  a  glory  of  fulfillment  which  no  (mt. 


THE  SWORD.  487 

certainly,  foresaw  in  the  days  of  its  uncouth  youth,  when 
naked  savages  splintered  each  other  with  flint  choppers. 

But  the  radiant  completion  of  its  imperial  course  presented 
certain  local  disparities ;  it  was  not  equally  magnificent  all 
over  Europe.  It  attained  its  fullest  p.erfection  only  in  the 
countries  where  chivalry  was  established,  and  even  in  them 
there  were  visible  differences  from  land  to  land.  The  ideal 
conception  was  not  the  same  ever)rwhere  ;  the  psychological 
sentiment  shifted  ;  the  creed  fluctuated ;  and,  above  all,  the 
external  expression  veered  about.  So  widely,  indeed,  did  all 
this  vary,  that,  strange  to  tell,  in  the  North  the  sword  was 
either  male,  as  in  Britain,  or  neuter,  as  in  Germany  (where, 
indeed,  girls  are  neuter  too) ;  while  in  the  South  it  was  uni- 
formly female !  What  a  discord  of  appreciation  is  revealed 
by  this  single  fact !  And  what  consequences  resulted  from 
it!  The  elegance,  the  poetry,  the  graceful  dignity  of  the 
sword  were  incontestably  most  ripened  on  the  sunny  soils  of 
France,  Italy,  and  Spain,  where  it  was  feminine ;  while  its 
force,  its  overwhelmingness,  and  its  harshness,  found  a  more 
congenial  place  in  the  colder  regions,  where  it  was  masculine 
or  neuter.  Of  course,  in  all  this,  national  temperaments  made 
themselves  felt.  Latitude  and  climate  and  genders  tvere  not 
alone  at  work ;  local  character,  local  usages,  and  local  neces- 
sities assisted  to  bring  about  local  deviations :  and,  between 
them,  they  made  up  a  very  perceptible  collection  of  variations. 
And  yet  all  these  external  influences,  numerous  and  contra- 
dictory as  they  were,  never  got  beyond  mere  details ;  they 
were  purely  superficial  in  their  action ;  not  one  of  them  ever 
told  upon  the  real  intrinsic  fortune  of  the  sword.  Surround- 
ing circumstances  never  exercised  a  substantial  effect  upon 
that  fortune.  They  altered  shapes,  or  names,  or  sizes,  and 
they  changed  views,  impressions,  and  fancies ;  but  they  went 
no  further.  Even  natural  laws,  universal  and  irresistible  as 
is  their  domination,  were  powerless  to  affect  the  fate  of  steel ; 
they  had  to  make  an  exception  in  the  case.    The  sword  per- 


48^  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

sisted  in  being  as  independent  of  their  sovereign  puissance 
as  of  mere  local  conditions  of  life :  it  scoffed  at  predestination 
and  order,  and  proclaimed  free-will  and  liberty.  Headlong, 
impetuous,  and  dazzling,  it  furnfshed  a  wonderful  example  of 
Pelagianism  and  Molinism  in  their  application  to  matter ;  and 
there  were  no  St.  Augustin  and  no  Jansenists  to  preach  against 
it.  Unlike  the  motion  of  light,  the  growth  of  potatoes,  the 
orbits  of  planets,  and  everything  in  general,  the  reckless  blade 
alone  has  always  been  unregulated  by  principles.  The  eter- 
nal edicts  which  steer  all  other  substances  whatever,  which 
govern  comets  and  earthquakes,  the  sun  and  electricity  and 
sound,  apple-trees,  diamonds,  and  rain,  and  ordinary  things  of 
that  sort — ^which  make  them  do  what  they  do  in  the  way  they 
do  it,  simply  because  they  cannot  help  themselves — have  had 
no  grasp  whatever  upon  swords.  Politics,  and  headache,  and 
appetite,  and  all  other  human*  weaknesses  whatever,  have  to 
be  submissively  obedient  to  the  great  central  guiding  forces  ; 
but  the  sword  has  acknowledged  no  higher  volition  than  its 
own.  It  stands  alone  as  the  successful  defier  of  Nature  and 
her  laws.  It  has  always  been  itself, — ^unchain^d,  enfranchised 
and  heroic,  the  archtype  of  arrogant  audacity,  of  fantastic 
spontaneity,  of  resplendent  freedom. 

And  really  it  did  not  make  a  bad  use  of  the  wild  liberty  it 
arrogated  to  itself.  It  went  fairly  straight  along  its  vaga- 
bonding road,  and  did  not  yield  too  contemptibly  to  the 
seductions  and  temptations  which  surrounded  its  steps.  It 
was  neither  too  haughty  nor  too  capricious — neither  too  cruel 
nor  too  childish.  It  is  true  that  Clotaire  II.  did  slay  all  thfe 
Saxons  who  were  taller  than  his  sword  (which  makes  us  hope 
they  were  a  small  race);  but  Procustes  went  through  the 
same  curtailing  proceeding  with  his  bed;  and  we  might  as 
well  accuse  beds  in  the  one  case  as  swords  in  the  other.  No, 
decidedly ;  the  sword  used  its  vast  power  well.  Its  memory 
is  not  that  of  a  tyrant ;  it  scarcely  ever  lost  the  consdoos- 
ness  of  its  high  estate,  of  its  duties  and  responsibilities;  it 


THE  SWORD,  489 

felt  that  noblesse  oblige,  and  behaved  accordingly.  With 
what  can  we  seriously  reproach  it  ?  What  has  it  done  that 
was  particularly  disgraceful?  Or,  more  exactly,  what  has 
it  done  that  was  more  disgraceful  than  what  everything  else 
around  it  was  doing  every  day  ?  More  people  have  died  of 
the  sea  than  of  fhe  sword,  and  with  quite  as  much  unpleas- 
antness of  treatment;  but  nobody  has  ever  presumed  to 
blame  the  waves  for  that ;  they  have  simply  carried  on  their 
legitimate  business,  which  is  drowning.  And  the  sword  has 
similarly  followed  its  own  calling,  and  has  made  holes  in  people 
to  let  out  their  lives,  that  is  all.  In  every  other  of  its  acts  it 
has  been  so  hjgh  and  admirable  that  mankind  instinctively 
adopted  it  as  the  natural  and  essential  symbol  of  lofty 
thoughts.  The  list  of  the  attributes  which  have  been  con- 
ferred upon  it  includes  nearly  all  the  generous  aspirations  of 
which  the  heart  is  susceptible ;  and  it  must  be  remembered 
that  it  possessed  them  not  merely  in  its  representative  capa- 
city as  an  emblem,  but  to  a  great  extent  also  in  its  effective 
being  as  an  achiever.  The  proverbs  of  all  nations  (which  are 
the  truest  measurers  of  popular  conviction)  speak  of  it  with 
reverence  and  trust :  it  was  everywhere  regarded  as  an  all- 
sufficient  type  and  token  of  the  higher  sentiments  and  higher 
tendencies  of  men.  It  was  only  by  exception  that  it  became 
sometimes  associated  with  low  longings  or  with  vulgar  thirsts. 
In  inspired  poets,  bards,  and  troubadors ;  it  was  the  theme  of 
glorious  song,  the  burden  of  true  tale,  the  subject  of  strange 
romance.  The  blood  which  dripped  from  it  did  not  defile  it ; 
it  remained  almost  unceasingly  and  almost  universally,  the 
"  good  sword  ;"  its  fair  fame  never  faded,  excepting  for  short 
rare  moments.  How,  otherwise,  could  it  have  held,  for  thou- 
sands of  years,  so  supreme  a  place,  as  the  model,  the  sign, 
and  the  expression  all  that  men  most  hallowed  ?  How  else 
could  it  have  reached  and  kept  so  marvelous  a  position  of 
ideal  nobility,  so  splendid  a  height  of  illustrious  personifica- 
tion ?    It  represented  almost  all  the  ambitions,  the  exaltation 


49^  '  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZINE. 

and  the  prides  of  men.  Fame,  courage,  and  glory ;  rank, 
dignity,  and  renown ;  greatness,  victory,  and  truth  ;  majesty 
and  honor,— have  all  been  incarnated  in  the  blade  of  steel, 
have  all  been  expressed  by  its  pregnant  name,  have  all  been 
contained  in  the  suggestive  ideas  which  it  conveyed.  What 
other  word  in  language  has  had  such  meanings  ?  What  other 
image  has  betokened  such  import?  What  other  sign  has 
pointed  to  such  associations? 

With  such  a  prodigious  function  as  this,  the  sword  seemed 
destined  to  immortality,  for  it  was  difficult  to  conceive  that 
men  would  be  able  to  do  without  an  assistant  whose  uses  and 
whose  senses  were  so  all-applicable.  And  yetlhc  immensity 
of  its  position  did  not  save  the  sword.  All  this  magnitude  of 
meaning,  all  this  significance  of  symbol,  all  this  accumulation 
of  elevated  thoughts,  served  for  nothing  when  the  day  of  ruin 
came.  They  cannot  be  forgotten,  but  they  go  back  further 
from  us  each  day.  The  poetic  aspects  of  the  sword  have  al- 
ready become  legendary :  no  one  selects  it  as  a  figure  now  ;  it 
is  a  sword,  in  our  time,  and  nothing  else.  Steel  is  no  more 
to  us  than  lead  or  putty ;  it  is,  like  them,  a  substance  used  in 
manufacture,  and  the  generation  of  to-day  would  no  more 
think  of  assigning  virtues  to  it  than  of  conceiving  that  putty 
can  make  love,  or  lead  teach  swimming.  The  change  which 
has  fallen  on  the  sword  is  not  a  mere  cessation  of  business — 
it  is  a  stoppage  of  life.  The  sword  is  no  longer  either  a 
weapon  or  an  idea  ;  we  no  longer  think  with  it,  we  no  longer 
respect  it. 

It  had  remained  f^:om  the  beginning  until  yesterday ;  and 
then  it  became  mortal  and  died.  It  is  g9ne :  and  when  we 
stand  in  armories  and  gaze  at  the  relics  which  testify  what 
it  once  was,  we  say,  with  a  sigh,  in  spite,  of  common  sense  and 
commerce,  "  A  great  soul  has  passed  out  from  amongst  us." 

From  Blackwood's  Magazine* 


THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE.        49 1 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

The  river  Annan,  rising  above  Moffat  in  Hartfell,  in  the 
Deil's  Beef  Tub,  descends  from  the  mountains  through  a  valley 
gradually  widening  and  spreading  out,  as  the  fells  are  left  be- 
hind, into  the  rich  and  well-cultivated  district  known  as 
Annandale.  Picturesque  and  broken  in  the  upper  part  of  its 
course,  the  stream  when  it  reaches  the  level  country,  steals 
slowly  among  meadows  and  undu^lating  wooded  hills,  till  at' 
the  end  of  fifty  miles  it  falls  into  the  Sol  way  at  Annan  town. 
Annandale,  famous  always  for  its  pasturage,  suffered  especially 
before  the  union  of  the  kingdoms  from  border  forays,  the 
effects  of  which  were  long  to  be  traced  in  a  certain  wildness 
of  disposition  in  tho  inhabitants.  Dumfriesshire,  to  which  it 
belongs,  was  sternly  Cameronia«.  Stories  of  the  persecutions 
survived  in  the  farmhouses  as  their  most  treasured  historical 
traditions.  Cameronian  congregations  lingered  till  the  begin- 
ning of  the  present  century,  when  they  merged  in  other 
bodies  of  secedsrs  from  the  established  religion.  In  its  hard 
fight  for  spiritual  freedom  Scotch  Protestantism  lost  respect 
for  kings  and  nobles,  and  looked  to  Christ  rather  than  to 
earthly  rulers.  Before  the  Reformation  all  Scotland  was 
clannish  or  feudal ;  and  the  Dumfriesshire  yeomanry,  like  the 
rest,  were  organized  under  great  noble  families,  whose  pennon 
they  followed,  whose  name  they  bore,  and  the  remotest  kin- 
dred with  which,  even  to  a  tenth  generation,  they  were  proud 
to  claim.  Among  the  families  of  the  western  border  the 
Carlyles  were  not  the  least  distinguished.  They  were  origi- 
nally English,  and  were  called  probably  after  Carlisle  town. 
They  came  to  Annandale  with  the  Bruces  in  the  time  of 
David  the  Second.  A  Sir  John  Carlyle  was  created  Lord 
Carlyle  of  Torthorwald  in  reward  for  a  beating  which  he  had 
given  the  English  at  Annan.  Michael,  the  fourth  lord,  signed 
the  Association  Bond  among  the  Protestant  lords  when  Queen 


492  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Mary  was  sent  to  Lochleven,  the  only  one  among  them,  it  was 
observed,  who  could  not  write  his  name.  Their  work  was 
rough.  They  were  rough  men  themselves,  and  with  the 
change  of  times  their  importance  declined.  The  title  lapsed, 
the  estates  were  dissipated  in  lawsuits,  and  by  the  middle  of 
the  last  century  nothing  remained  of  the  Carlyles  but  one  or 
two  households  in  the  neighborhood  of  Burnswark  who  had 
inherited  the  name  either  through  the  adoption  by  their 
forefathers  of  the  name  of  their  leader,  or  by  some  descent 
of  blood  which  had  trickled  down  through  younger  sons.* 

In  one  of  these  families,  in  a  house  which  his  father,  who 
was  a  mason,  had  built  with  his  own  hands,  Thomas  Carlyle 
was  born  on  the  4th  of  December,  1795.  Ecplefechan,  where 
his  father  lived,  is  a  small  market  town  on  the  east  side  of 
Annandale,  six  miles  inland  from  the  Solway,  and  about  six- 
teen on  the  Great  North  Road  from  Carlisle. t  It  consists  of  a 
single  street,  down  one  side  of  which,  at  that  time,  ran  an 
open  brook.  The  aspect,  like  that  of  most  Scotch  towns,  is 
cold,  but  clean  and  orderly,  with  an  air  of  thrifty  comfort. 
The  houses  are  plain,  that  in  which  the  Carlyles  lived  aloi^e 
having  pretensions  to  originality.  In  appearance  one,  it  is 
really  double,  a  central  arch  dividing  it.  James  Carlyle, 
Thomas  Carlyle 's  father,  occupied  one  part.  His  brother, 
who  was  his  partner  in  his  trade,  lived  in  the  other. 

In  1 791,  having  then  a  house  of  his  own,  James  Carlyle 
married  a  distant  cousin  of  the  same  name,  Janet  Carlyle. 
They  had  one  son,  John,  and  then  she  died  of  fever.  Her 
long  fair  hair,  which  had  been  cut  off  in  her  illness,  remained 
as  a  memorial  of  her  in  a  drawer,  into  which  fhe  children 
afterwards  looked  with  wondering  awe.    Two  years  after  the 

*  When  Carlyle  became  famous,  a  Dumfries  antiquary  traced  his  ancestry  with  ^>- 
parent  success  through  ten  generations  to  the  first  Lord  Torthorwald.  There  w»$ 
much  laughter  about  it  ia  the  house  in  Cheyne  Row,  but  Carlyle  was  inclioed  to  tkink 
on  the  whole  that  the  descent  was  real.  \ 

t  Ecclefechan— Kirkfechan,  church  of  St.^Fechanns,  an  Irish  saint  supposed  tolirtt  J 

come  to  Annandale  in  the  seventh  century. 


vj^^^kJ 


THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF^  THOMAS  CARL  YLE,        493 

husband  married  again  Margaret  Aitken,  "a  woman,"  says 
Carlyle,  "of  to  me  the  fairest  descent,  that  of  the  pious,  the 
just,  and  the  wise."  Her  character  will  unfold  itself  as  the 
story  goes  on.  Thomas  Carlyle  was  her  first  child  ;  she  lived 
to  see  him  at  the  height  of  his  fame,  known  and  honored 
wherever  the  English  language  was  spoken.  To  her  care 
"  for  body  and  soul "  he  never  ceased  to  say  that  "  he  owed 
endless  gratitude."  After  Thomas  came  eight  others,  three 
sons  and  five  daughters,  one  of  whom,  Janet,  so  called  after 
the  first  wife,  died  when  she  was  a  few  months  old. 

The  family  was  prosperous,  as  Ecclefechan  working  men 
understood  prosperity.  In  one  year,  his  best,  James  Cariyle 
made  in  his  business  as  much  as  ^loo.  At  worst  he  earned 
an  artisan's  substantial  wages,  and  was  thrifty  and  prudent. 
The  children,  as  they  passed  out  of  infancy,  ran  about  bare- 
foot, but  otherwise  cleanly  clothed,  and  fed  on  oatmeal,  milk, 
and  potatoes.  Our  Carlyle  learned  to  read  from  his  mother 
too  early  for  distinct  remembrance ;  when  he  was  five  his 
father  taught  him  arithmetic,  and  sent  him  with  the  other 
village  boys  to  school.  Like  the  Carlyles  generally  he  had  a 
violent  tej;nper.  John,  the  son  of  the  first  marriage,  lived 
generally  with  his  grandfather,  but  came  occasionally  to  visit 
his  parents.  Carlyle's  earliest  recollection  is  of  throwing  his 
little  brown  stool  at  his  brother  in  a  mad  passion  of  rage, 
when  he  was  scarcely  more  than  two  years  old,  breaking  a  leg 
of  it,  and  "  feeling  for  the  first  time  the  united  pangs  of  loss' 
and  remorse."  The  next  impression  which  most  affected  him 
was  the  small  round  heap  under  the  sheet  upon  a  bed  where 
his  little  sister  lay  dead.  Death,  too,  he  made  acquaintance 
with  in  another  memorable  form.  His  father's  eldest  brother 
John  died.  "  The  day  before  his  funeral,  an  ill-behaving  ser- 
vant wench  lifted  the  coverlid  off  his  pale,  ghastly,  befilleted 
head  to  show  it  to  some  crony  of  hers,  unheeding  of  the  child 
who  was  alone  with  them,  and  to  whom  the  sight  gave  a  new 
pang  of  horror."    The  grandfather  followed  next,  closing 


494  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

« 

finally  his  Anson  and  his  Arabian  Nights.  He  had  a  brother 
whose  adventures  had  been  remarkable.  Francis  Carlyle,  so 
he  was  called,  had  been  apprenticed  to  a  shoemaker.  He, 
too,  when  his  time  was  out,  had  gone  to  England,  to  Bristol 
among  other  places,  where  he  fell  into  drink  and  gambling^ 
He  lost  all  his  money ;  one  morning  after  an  orgie  he  flung 
himself  desperately  out  of  bed  and  broke  his  leg.  When  he 
recovered  he  enlisted  in  a  brig  of  war,  distinguished  himself 
by  special  gallantry  in  supporting  his  captain  in  a  mutiny,  and 
was  rewarded  with  the  command  of  a  Solway  revenue  cutter. 
After  many  years  of  rough  creditable  service  he  retired  on 
half-pay  to  his  native  village  of  Middlebie.  There  had  been 
some  family  quarrel,  and  the  brothers,  though  living  close  to 
one  another,  had  held  no  intercourse.  They  were  both  of 
them  above  eighty  years  of  s^e.  The  old  Thomas  being  on 
his  death-bed,  the  sea  captain's  heart  relented.  He  was  a 
grim,  broad,  fierce-looking  man ;  *'  prototyp*e  of  Smollet's 
Trunnion."  Being  too  unwieldy  to  walk,  he  was  brought 
into  Ecclefechan  in  a  cait,  and  carried  in  a  chair  up  the  steep 
stairs  to  his  dying  brother's  room.  There  he  remained  some 
twenty  minutes,  and  came  down  2igain  with  a  face  which 
printed  itself  i«i  the  little  Carlyle's  memory.  They  saw  him 
no  more,  and  after  a  brief  interval  the  old  genertition  had  dis- 
appeared. 

Amidst  such  scenes  our  Carlyle  struggled  through  his  early 
boyhocKi.^ 

It  was  not  a  joyful  life  (he  says)  ;  what  life  is  ?  yet  a  safe  and  qui^t  one,  above  most 
others,  or  any  other  I  have  witnessed,  a  wholesome  one.  We  were  taciturn  rather 
than  talkative,  biit  if  little  was  said  that  little  had  generally  a  meaning. 

More  remarkable  man  than  my  father  I  have  never  met  in  my  journey  through  life ; 
sterling  sincerity  in  thought,  word,  and  deed,  mostly  quiet,  but  capable  of  blazing 
into  whirlwinds  when  needful,  and  such  a  flash  of  just  insight  and  brief  natural  elo- 
quence and  emphasis,  true  to  every  feature  of  it  as  I  have  never  known  in  any  other. 
Humor  of  a  most  grim  Scandinavian  type  he  occasionally  had  ;  wit  rarely  or  never — 
too  serious  for  wit — my  excellent  mother  with  perhaps  the  deej)er  piety  in  most 
senses  had  also  the  most  sport.  No  man  of  my  day,  or  hardly  any  man,  can  have  had 
better  parents. 

Education  is  a  passion  in  Scotland.  It  is  the  pride  of  every 
honorable  peai:>ant,  if  he  has  a  son  of  any  promise,  to  give  him 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE,  At<)^ 

a  chance  of  rising  as  a  scholar.  As  2i  child  Carlyle  could  not 
have  failed  to  show  that  there  was  something  unusual  in  him. 
The  schoolmaster  in  Ecclefechan  gave  a  good  account  of  his 
progress  in  "  figures.'*  The  minister  reported  favorably  of  his 
Latin,  "  I  do  not  grudge  thee  thy  schooling,"  Tom,  his  father 
said  to  him  one  day,  "  now  that  thy  uncle  Frank  owns  thee  a 
better  arithmetician  than  himself."  U  was  decided  that  he 
should  go  to  Annan  Grammar  School,  and  thence,  if  he  pros- 
pered, to  the  University,  with  final  outlook  to  the  ministry. 

He  was  a  shy,  thoughtful  boy,  shrinking  generally  from 
rough  companions,  but  with  a  hot  and  even  violent  temper. 
His  mother,  naturally  anxious  for  him,  and  fearing  perhaps 
the.  family  tendency,  extracted  a  promise  before  parting  with 
him  that  he^would  never  return  a  blow,  and,  as  might  be  ex- 
pected, his  first  experieyaces  of  school  were  extremely  miser- 
able. Boys  of  genius  are  never  well  received  by  the  common 
flock,  and  escape  persecution  only  when  they  are  able  to  de- 
fend themselves. 

"  Startor  Resartus  "  is  generally  mythic,  but  parts  are  his- 
torical, and  among  them  the  account  of  the  first  launch  of 
Teufelsdrockh  into  the  Hinterschlag  Gymnawum.  Hinter- 
schlag  (Shiack.  behind)  is  Annan.  Thither,  leaving  home  and 
his  mother's  side,  Carlyle  was  taken  by  his  father,  being  then 
in  his  tenth  year,  and  "fluttering  with  boundless  hopes/'  at 
Whitsuntide,  1805,  to  the  school  which  was  to  be  his  fijrst  step 
into  a  higher  life. 

Well  do  I  remember  (says  Teufelsdrockh)  the  red  sunny  Whitsuntide  momingwhen, 
trotting  full  of  hope  by  the  side  of  Father  Andreas,  I  entered  the  main  street  of  the 
place  and  saw  its  steeple  clock  (then  striking  eight)  and  Schuldthurm  (jail)  and  the 
apoconed  or  disaproned  burghers  moving  in  to  breakfast ;  a  little  dog,  in  mad  terror, 
was  rushing  past,  for  some  human  imps  had  tied  a  tin  kettle  to  its  tail,  fit  emblem  of 
moch  that  awaited  myself  in  that  mischievous  den.  Alas !  the  kind  beech  rows  of 
Sntepf uhl  (Ecclefechan)  were  hidden  in  the  distance.  I  was  among  strangers  harshly, 
at  best  indifferently,  disposed  to  me  ;  the  young  heart  felt  for  the  first  time  quite  or- 
phaned and  alone.  .  .  .  My  schoolfellows  were  boys,  mostly  rude  boys,  and  obeyed  the 
impulse  of  rude  nature  which  bids  the  deer-herd  fall  upon  any  stricken  hart,  the  duck- 
flock  put  to  death  any  broken-winged  brother  or  sister,  and  on  all  hands  the  strong 
tyrannize  over  the  weak. 

Carlyle  retained  to  the  end  of  his  days  a  painful  and  indeet' 


49^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,.  ' 

rescntftil  recollection  of  these  school  experiences  of  his. 
"  This,"  he  said  of  the  passage  just  quoted  from  Sartor,  "  is 
true,  and  not  half  the  truth.  Unspeakable  is  the  damage  and 
defilement  I  received  from  those  coarse,  misguided,  tyrannous 
cubs.  Oneway  and  another^I  had  never  been  so  wretched  as 
here,  and  the  first  two  years  of  my  time  I  still  count  amoi^ 
,  the  miserable  of  my  life." 

He  had  obeyed  his  mother's  injunctions.  He  had  courage 
in  plenty  to  resent  ill  usage,  but  his  promise  was  sacred.  He 
was  passionate;  but  fight  he  would  not,  and  every  one  who 
knows  English  and  Scotch  life  will  understand  what  his  fate 
must  have  been.  One  consequence  was  a  near  escape  from 
drowning.  The  boys  had  all  gone  to  bathe  ;  the  lonely  child 
had  strayed  apart  from  the  rest,  where  he  could  escape  from 
being  tormented.  He  found  himself  in  a  deep  pool  which  had 
been  dug  out  for  a  dock  and  had  been  filled  with  thi^  tide. 
The  mere  accident  of  some  one  passing  at  the  time  saved 
him.  At  length  he  could  bear  his  condition  no  longer;  he 
turned  on  the  biggest  bully  in  the  school  and  furiously  kicked 
him ;  a  battle  followed  in  which  he  was  beaten  ;  but  he  left 
marks  of  his  fists  upon  his  adversary,  which  were  not  forgot- 
ten. He  taught  his  companions  to  fear  him,  if  Only  like 
Brasidas's  mouse.  He  was  persecuted  no  longer,  but  he  car- 
ried away  bitter  and  resentful  recollections  of  what  he  had 
borne,  which  were  never  entirely  obliterated. 

The  teaching  which  Carlyle  received  at-  Annan,  he  sa]rs, 
'*  was  limited,  and  of  its  kind  only  moderately  good.  Latin 
and  French  I  did  get  to  read  with  fluency.  Latin  quan- 
tity was  left  a  frightful  chaos,  and  I  had  to  learn  it  after- 
wards ;  some  geometry ;  algebra,  arithmetic  tolerably  'Wfell. 
Vague  outlines  of  geography  I  learned  ;  all  the  books  I  could 
get  were  also  devoured.  Greek  consisted  of  the  alphabet 
merely."  Of  holidays  we  hear  nothing,  though  holidays 
there  must  have  been  at  Christmas  and  Midsummer ;  BjtUc 
also  of  school  friendships  or  amusements.    In  the  k^^ 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE,        497 

such  shape  as  could  have  been  found  in  boys  of  his  class  in 
Annan,  Carlyle  could  have  had  little  interest.  He  €poke 
warmly  of  his  mathematical  teacher,  a  certain  Mr.  Morley 
from  Cumberland,  "  whom  he  loved  much,  and  who  taught 
him  well."  He  hafl  formed  a  comradeship  with  one  or  two 
boys  of  his  own  age,  who  were  not  entirely  uncongenial  to 
liim :  but  only  one  incident  is  preserved  which  was  of  real 
moment.  In  his  third  y^ar  Carlyle  first  consciously  saw  Ed- 
ward Irving.  Irving's  family  lived  in  Annan.  He  had  him- 
self been  at  the  school,  and  had  gone  thence  to  the  University 
of  Edinburgh.  He  had  distinguished  himself  there,  gained 
prizes,  and  was  otherwise  honorably  spoken  of.  Annan>  both 
town  and  school,  was  proud  of  the  brilliant  lad  that  they  had 
produced  ;  and  Irving  one  day  looked  in  upon  the  school,  the 
masters  out  of  compliment  attending  him.  "  He  was  scrupu- 
lously dressed,  black  coat,  t%ht  pantaloonsi  in  the  fashion  of 
the  day,  and  looked  very  neat,  self-possessed,  and  amiable  ;  a 
flourishing  slip  of  a  youth  with  coal-black  hair,  swarthy,  clear 
complexion,  very  straight  on  his  feet,  and,  except  for  the 
glaring  squint,  decidedly  handsome."  The  boys  listened 
eagerly  as  he  talked  in  a  free  airy  way  about  Edinburgh  and 
its  professors.  A  University  man  who  has  made  a  name  for 
himself  is  infinitely  admirable  to  younger  ones ;  he  is  not  too 
far  above  them  to  be  comprehensible ;  they  know  what  he 
has  done,  and  they  hope  distantly  tHat  they  too  one  day  may 
do  the  like.  Of  course  Irving  did  not  distinguish  Carlyle. 
He  walked  through  the  rooms  and  disappeared. 

The  Hinterschlajg"  Gymnasium  was  over  soon  after,  and 
Carlyle's  future  career  was  now  to  tie  decided  on.  The  Ec- 
clefechan  family  life  did  not  k)ok  with  favor  on  displays  of 
precocious  genius.  Vanity  wad  the  last  quality  that  such  a 
man  as  James  Carlyle  would  encourage,  and  there  was  a 
severity  in  his  manner  which  effectively  repressed  a  disposi- 
tion to  it. 

*   We  had  all  to  complain  (CarlyTc  says)  that  we  dared  not  freely  kve  otir  father. 


498  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,     '  " 

His  heart  seemed  as  if  walled  in.  My  mother  has  owned  to  me  that  ^e  could  never 
understand  him,  and  that  her  affection  and  admiration  of  him  were  obstructed.  It 
seemed  as  if  an  atmosphere  of  fear  repelled  us  from  him,  me  especially.  My  heart 
and  tongue  played  freely  with  my  mother.  He  had  an  air  of  deepest  gravity  and  even 
sternness.  He  had  the  most  entire  and  open  contempt  for  idle  tattle — what  he  called 
clatter.  Any  talk  that  had  meaning  in  it  he  could  listen  to  ;  what  had  no  meaning  in 
it,  above  all  what  seemed  false,  he  absolutely  could  not  and  would  not  hear,  but  ab- 
ruptly turned  from  it.  Long  may  we  remember  his  "  I  don^t  t>elieve  thee  *' ;  his  tongue- 
paralyzing  cold  indifferent  **  HaJi." 

B3sides  fear,  Carlyle,  as  he  grew  older,  began  ta  experience 
a  certain  awe  of  his  father  as  of  a  person  of  altogether  superior 
qualities. 

None  of  us  (he  writes)  MriU  ever  foif;;«t  that  bold  glowing  style  of  his,  flowing  free 
from  the  untutored  soul,  full  of  metaphor,  though  he  knew  not  what  metaphor  was, 
with  all  manner  of  potent  words  which  he  appropriated  and  applied  with  surprising 
accuracy — ^brief,  energetic^  conveying  the  most  perfect  picture,  definite)  clear,  sot  ia 
ambitious  colors,  but  in  full  white  sunlight.  Einphatic  I  have  heard  him  beyond  all 
men.  In  anger  lie  had  no  need  of  oaths  *  his  words  were  like  sharp  arrows  that  smote 
into  the  very  heart. 

Such  a  father  may  easily  have  been  alarming  and  slow  to 
gain  his  children's  confidence.  He  had  silently  observed  his 
little  Tom,  however.  The  reports  from  the  Annan  masters 
were  all  favorable,  and  when  the  question  rose  what  was  to 
be  done  with  him,  inclined  to  venture  the  University.  The 
wise  men  of  Ecclefechan  shook  their  heads.  "  Educate  a 
boy/'  said  one  of  them,  "  and  he  grows  up  to  despise  his 
ignorant  parents."  Others  said  it  was  a  risk,  it  was  waste  of 
money,  there  was  a  large  family  to  be  provided  for,  too  much 
must  not  be  spent  upon  one,  etc.  James  Carlyle  had  seen 
something  in  his  boy's  character  which  showed  him  that  the 
risk,  if  risk  there  was,  must  be  ventured ;  and  to  Edinburgh 
it  was  decided  that  Tom  should  go  and  be  made  a  scholar  of. 

To  English  ears  university  life  suggests  splendid  buildings, 
luxurious  rooms,  rich  endowments  as  the  reward  of  successful 
industry ;  the  students  as  young  men  between  nineteen  and 
twenty-three  with  hsuidsome  allowances,  spending  each  of 
them  on  an  average  double  the  largest  income  which  James 
Carlyle  had  earned  in  any  year  of  his  life.  Universities  north 
of  the  Tweed  had  in  those  days  no  money  prizes  to  offer,  no 
fellowships  and  schQlarships,  nothing  at  all  but  an  education 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THO^MAS  CARLYLE,        At<^ 

and  a  discipline  in  poverty  and  self-denial.  The  lads  who 
went  to  them  were  the  children,  for  the  most  part,  of  parents 
as  poor  as  Carlyle's  father.  They  knew  at  what  a  cost  the  ex- 
pense of  sending  them  to  college,  relatively  small  as  it  was, 
could  be  afforded ;  and  they  went  with  the  fixed  purpose  of 
making  the  very  utmost  of  their  time.  Five  months  only  of 
each  year  could  they  remain  in  their  classes ;  for  the  rest  of  it 
they  taught  pupils  themselves  or  worked  on  the  farm  at  home 
to  pay  for  their  own  learning. 

Each  student,  as  a  rule,  was  the  most  promising  member  of 
the  family  to  which  he  belonged,  and  extraordinary  confidence 
was  placed  in  them.  They  were  sent  to  Edinburgh,  Glasgow, 
or  wherever  it  rnight  be,  when  they  were  mere  boys  of  four- 
teen. They  had  no  one  to  look  after  them  either  on  their 
journey  or  when  they  came  to  the  end.  They  walked  from 
their  homes,  being  unable  to  pay  for  coach-hire.  They  en- 
tered their  own  names  at  the  college.  They  found  their  own 
humble  lodgings,  and  were  left  entirely  to  their  own  capacity 
for  self-conduct.  The  carriers  brought  them  oatmeal,  potatoes, 
and  salt  butter  from  the  home  farm,  with  a  few  eggs  oc- 
casionally as  a  luxury.  With  their  thrifty  habits  they  required 
no  other  food.  In  the  return  cart  their  linen  went  back  to 
their  mothers  to  be  washed  and  mended.  Poverty  protected 
them  from  temptations  to  vicious  amusements.  They  formed 
their  economical  friendships ;  they  shared  their  breakfasts  and 
their  thoughts,  and  had  their  clubs  for  conversation  or  dis- 
cussion. When  term  was  over  they  walked  home  in  parties, 
each  district  having  its  little  knot  belonging  to  it ;  and,  known 
along  the  roads  as  University  scholars,  they  were  assured  of 
entertainment  on  the  way. 

As  a  training  in  self-dependence  no  better  education  could 
have  been  found  in  these  islands.  If  the  teaching  had  been 
as  good  as  the  discipline  of  character,  the  Scotch  universities 
might  have  competed  with  the  world.  The  teaching  was  the 
weak  part.    There  were  no  funds,  cither  in  the  colleges  or 


500  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

with  the  students,  to  provide  personal  instruction  as  at  Oxford 
and  Cambridge.  The  professors  were  individually  excellent, 
but  they  had  to  teach  large  classes,  and  had  no  leisure  to 
attend  particularly  to  this  or  that  promising  pupil.  The  uni- 
versities were  opportunities  to  boys  who  were  able  to  take 
advantage  of  them,  and  that  was  all. 

Such  was  the  life  on  which  Carlyle  was  now  to  enter,  and 
such  were  the  circumstances  of  it.  It  was  the  NovembeJ 
term,  1809.  He  was  to  be  fourteen  on  the  fourth  of  the  ap- 
proaching December.  Edinburgh  is  nearly  one  hundred 
miles  from  Ecclefechan.  He  was  to  go  on  foot,  like  the  rest, 
under  the  guardianship  of  a  boy  named  **  Tom  Smail,"  two  or 
three  years  his  senior,  who  had  already  been  at  college,  and 
was  held,  therefore,  to  be  a  sufficient  protector. 

How  strangely  vivid  (he  says  in  1866),  how  remote  and  wonderful,  tinged  with  the 
hues  of  far-off  love  and  sadness,  is  that  journey  to  me  now  after  fifty-seven  years  of 
time !  My  mother  and  father  walking  with  me  in  the  dark  frosty  November  moraias 
through  the  village  to  set  us  on  our  way  ;  my  dear  and  loving  mother,  her  tremulous 
affection,  my,  etc. 

Of  the  University  he  says  that  he  learned  little  there.  In 
the  Latin  class  he  was  under  Professor  Christieson,  who 
**  never  noticed  him  nor  could  distinguish  him  from  another 
Mr.  Irving  Carlyle,  an  older,  bigger  boy,  with  red  hair,  wild 
buck  teeth,  and  scorched  complexion,  and  the  worst  Latinist 
of  his  acquaintance." 

In  the  classical  field  (he  writes  elsewhere)  T  am  truly  as  nothing.  Homer  I  learned  to 
read  in  the  original  with  difficulty,  after  Wolf's  broad  flash  of  light  thrown  into  ir; 
^schylus  and  Sophocles  mainly  in  translations.  Tacitus  and  Virgil  became  really  in> 
teresting  to  me ;  Homer  and  ^schylus  above  all ;  Horace  egoistical,  leichtfertig.  vol 
sad  fact  I  never  cared  for ;  Cicero,  after  long  and  various  triah(,  always  proved  a  vintfy 
person  and  a  weariness  to  me,  extinguished  altogether  by  Middleton*s  excellent  though 
misjudging  life  of  him. 

It  was  not  much  better  with  philosophy.  Dugald  Stewart 
had  gone  away  two  years  before  Carlyle  entered.  Brown  was 
the  new  professor,  "an  eloquent,  acute  little  gentleman,  full 
of  enthusiasm  about  simple  and  relative  suggestions,"  to 
Carlyle  unprofiable  utterly,  and  bewildering  and  dispiritiog, 
as  the  autumn  winds  among  withered  leaves. 


;      THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE.        ^01. 

In  mathematics  only  he  made  real  progress.  His  tempera- 
ment was  impatient  of  uncertainties.  He  threw  himself  with 
delight  into  a  form  of  knowledge  in  which  the  conclusions 
were  indisputable,  where  at  each  step  he  could  plant  his  foot 
with  confidence.  Professor  Leslie  (Sir  John  Leslie  after- 
wards) discovered  his  talent,  and  exerted  himself  to  help  him 
with  a  zeal  of  which  Carlyle  never  afterwards  ceased  to  speak 
with  gratitude.  Yet  e«en  here,  on  ground  with  which  he 
was  familiar,  his  shy  nature  was  unfitted  for  display.  He  car- 
ried off  no  prizes.  He  tried  only  once,  and  though  he  was 
notoriously  superior  to  his  competitors,  the  crowd  and  noise 
of  the  class-room  prevented  him  from  even  attempting  to 
distinguish  himself.  I  have  heard  him  say  late  in  life  that 
his  thoughts  never  came  to  him  in  proper  form  except  when 
he  was  alone. 

The  teaching  at  a  university  is  but  half  what  is  learned 
there ;  the  other  half,  and  the  most  important,  is  what  young 
men  learn  from  one  another.  Carlyle's  friends  at  Edinburgh, 
the  eleven  out  of  the  eleven  hundred,  were  of  his  own  rank 
of  life,  sons  of  peasants  who  had  their  own  way  to  make  in 
life.  From  their  letters,  many  of  which  have  been  pre- 
served, it  is  clear  that  they  were  clever  good  lads,  distinctly 
superior  to  ordinary  boys  of  their  age,  Carlyle  himself  holding 
the  first  place  in  their  narrow  circle.  Their  lives  were  pure 
and  simple.  Nowhere  in  these  letters  is  there  any  jesting 
with  vice,  or  light  allusions  to  it.  The  boys  wrote  to  one  an- 
other on  the  last  novel  of  Scott  or  poem  of  Byron,  on  the 
Edinburgh  Review,  on  the  war,  on  the  fall  of  Napoleon,  occa- 
sionally on  geometrical  problems,  sermons,  college  exercises, 
and  divinity  lectures,  and  again  on  innocent  trifles,  with 
sketches,  now  and  then  humorous  and  bright,  of  Annandale 
life  as  it  was  seventy  years  ago.  They  looked  to  Carlyle  to 
direct  their  judgment  and  advise  them  in  difficulties.  He  was 
the  prudent  one  of  the  party,  able,  if  money  matters  went 
wrong,  to  help  them  out  of  his  humble  savings.     He  was 


502  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

already  noted,  too,  for  power  of  effective  speech — "far  too 
sarc.Tstic  for  so  young  a  man  "  was  what  elder  people  said  of  him . 
One  of  his  correspondents  addressed  him  always  as  "Jona- 
than," or  **  Dean,"  or  "  Doctor,"  as  if  he  was  to  be  a-second 
Swift.  Others  called  him  Parson,  perhaps  from  his  intended 
profession.  All  foretold  future  greatness  to  him  of  one  kind 
or  another.  They  recognized  that  he  was  not  like  other  men. 
that  he  was  superior  to  other  merfTin  character  as  well  as 
intellect.  "  Knowing  how  you  abhor  all"  affectation "  is  an 
expression  used  to  him  when  he  was  still  a  mere  boy. 

His  destination  was,  "the  ministry,"  and  for  this,  knowing 
how  much  his  father  and  mother  wished  it,  he  tried  to  pre- 
pare himself.  He  was  already  conscious,  however,  "  that  he 
had  not  the  least  enthusiasm  for  that  business,  that  even 
grave  prohibitory  doubts  were  gradually  rising  ahead."  It 
has  been  supposed  that  he  disliked  the  formalism  of  the 
Scotch  church ;  but  formalism,  he  says,  was  not  the  pinching 
point,  had  there  been  the  preliminary  of  belief  forthcoming. 
"  No  church  or  speaking  entity  whatever  can  do  without  for- 
mulas, but  it  must  believe  them  first  if  it  would  be  honest." 

Two  letters  to  Carlyle  from  one  of  these  early  friends  may 
be  given  here  as  specimens  of  the  rest.  They  bring  back  the 
Annandale  of  1814,  and  show  a  faint  kind  of  image  of  Carlyle 
himself  reflected  on  the  writer's  mind.  His  name  was  Hill.  He 
was  about  Carlyle's  age,  and  subscribes  himself  Peter  Pindar. 

To  T,  Carlyle, 

Castlebank,  Jan.  i,  1814. 
WindS.W.    Weather  hazy. 
What  is  the  life  of  man  ?    Is  it  not  to  shift  from  trouble  to  trouble  and  from  side  to 
side  ?  to  button  up  one  cause  of  vexation  and  unbutton  another  ?    So  wrote  the  cde- 
brated  Sterne,  so  quoted  the  no  less  celebrated  Jonathan,  and  so  may  the  poor  devil 
Pindar  apply  it  to  himself.    You  mention  some  two  or  three  disappointments  you  have 
met  with  lately.     For  shame,  sir,  to  be  so  peevish  and  splenetic !     Your  disappoint- 
ments are  "  trifles  light  as  air"  when  compared  with  the  vexations  and  disappointments 
I  have  experienced.    I  was  vexed  and  grieved  to  the  very  soul  and  beyond  the  soul,  to 
go  to   Galloway  and  be  deprived  of  the  pleasure  of — something  you  know  nothing 
about.     I  was  disappointed  on  my  return  at  finding  her  in  a  devil  of  a  bad  $hy  humor. 
I  was — but  why  do  I  talk  to  you  about  such  things  ?    There  are  joys  and  soirows, 
_  pleasures  and  pains,  with  which  a  Stoic  Platonic  humdrum  bookworm  sort  of  le^kv 
~  like  you,  sir,  intermeddleth  not,  and  consequently  can  have  no  idea  of.    I  was'disap-. 


iJ 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE,  $03 

pointed  in  Bonaparte's  escaping  to  Paris  when  he  ought  to  have  been  taken  prisoner 
by  the  allies  at  Leipsic.  I  was  disappointed  at  your  not  mentioning  anything  about 
our  old  acquaincaaces  at  Edinburgh.  Last  night  there  was  a  flag  on  the  mail,  and 
to>night  when  I  expected  a  Gazette  announcing  some  great  victory,  the  taking  of 
Bayonne  or  the  marching  of  Wellington  to  Bordeaux,  I  was  disappointed  that  the 
caufte  of  all  the  rejoicing  was  an  engagement  with  the  French  under  the  walls  of 
Bayonne,  in  which  we  lost  upwards  of  500  men  killed  and  3,000  wounded,  and  drew  off 
the  remainder  of  our  army  safe  from  the  destroying  weapons  of  the  enemy.  I  was  dis- 
appointed last  Sunday,  after  I  had  got  my  stockings  on,  to  find  that  there  was  a  hole  in 
the  heel  of  one  of  them.  I  read  a  great  many  books  at  Kirkton,  and  was  disappointed 
at  finding  faults  in  almost  every  one  of  them.  I  will  be  disappointed ;  but  what  signi- 
fies going  on  at  this  rate  ?     Unmixed  happiness  is  not  the  lot  of  man — 

Of  chance  and  change,  oh  !  let  not  man  complain. 

Else  never,  never,  will  he  cease  to  wail. 
The  weather  is  dull ;  I  am  melancholy.    Good  night. 

T.  S. — My  dearest  Dean, — The  weather  is  quite  altered.  The  wind  has  veered  about 
to  the  north.    I  am  in  good  spirits^  am  happy 

From  the  same, 

Castlebank,  May  9, 1814. 

Dear  Doctor, — I  received  yours  last  night,  and  a  scumlous,  blackguarding,  flattering, 
vexing,  pernicked,  humorous,  witty,  daft  letter  it  is.  Shall  I  answer  it  piecemeal,  as  a 
certain  Honorable  House  does  a  speech  from  its  sovereign,  by  echoing  back  each  syl- 
lable ?  No.  This  won't  do.  Oh  !  how  I  envy  you,  Dean,  that  you  can  run  on  in  such 
an  offhand  way,  ever  varying  the  scene  with  wit  and  mirth,  while  honest  Peter  must 
hold  on  in  one  numbskull  track  to  all  eternity  pursuing  the  even  tenor  of  his  way,  so 
that  one  of  Peter's  letters  is  as  good  as  a  thousand. 

You  seem  to  taj<e  friendly  concern  in  my  affaires  de  coeur.  By  the  by,  now,  Jona- 
than, without  telling  you  any  particulars  of  my  situation  in  these  matters,  which  is 
scarcely  known  to  myself, can't  I  advise ^<7m  to  fall  in  love?  Granting  as  I  do  that  it 
is  attended  with  sorrows,  still.  Doctor,  these  are  amply  compensated  by  the  tenden  cy 
that  this  tender  passion  has  to  ameliorate  the  heart,  "  provided  always,  and  be  it  fur- 
ther enacted,"  that,  chaste  as  Don  Quixote  or  Don  Quixote's  horse,  your  heart  never 
breathes  a  wish  that  angels  may  not  register.  Only  have  care  of  this.  Dean,  and  fall 
in  love  as  soon  as  you  can — you  will  be  the  better  for  it. 

Pages  follow  of  excellent  criticism  from  Peter  on  Leyden's 
poems,  on  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  Miss  Porter,  etc.  Carlyle 
has  told  him  that  he  was  looking  for  a  subject  for  an  epic  poem. 
Peter  gives  him  a  tragi-comic  description  of  a  wedding  at 
Middlebie,  with  the  return  home  in  a  tempest,  which  he 
thinks  will  answer ;  and  concludes  : — 

Your  reflections  on  the  fall  of  Napoleon  bring  to  my  mind  an  observation  of  a  friend 
of  mine  the  other  day.  I  was  repeating  these  lines  in  Shakespeare  and  applying  them 
to  Bony — 

But  yesterday  the  word  of  Caesar  might 
^       Have  stood  against  the  world  ;  now  fies  he  there, 
And  none  so  poor  to  do  him  reverence. 

**  Aye,  very  true,'*  quoth  he  ;  *'  the  fallow  could  na  be  content  wi*  maist  all  Europe, 
and  now  he's  glad  o'  Elba  room." 
Now,  Doctor,  let  me  repeat  my  instructions  to  you  in  a  few  words.    Write  immedi- 


S04  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

ate]y  a  very  long  letter ;  write  an  epic  poem  as  soon  as  may  be.    Send  me  some  mora 
**  remarks."    Tell  me  how  you  are,  how  you  are  spending  your  time  in  EdinboiRh. 
Fall  in  love  as  soon  as  you  can  meet  with  a  proper  object.    Ever  be  a  friend  tc 
•  Pindar,  and  thou  shalt  always  find  one  in  the  heart-subdued,  not  subduing 

PSTER. 

In  default  of  writings  of  his  own,  none  of  which  survive 
out  of  this  early  period,  such  lineaments  of  Carlyle  as  appear 
through  these  letters  are  not  without  instructiveness. 

Having  finished  his  college  course,  Carlyle  k)oked  out  for 
pupils  to  maintain  himself.  The  ministry-was  still  his  formal 
destination,  but  several  years  had  still  to  elapse  before  a  final 
resolution  would  be  necessary — four  years  if  he  remained  in 
Edinburgh  attending  lectures  in  the  Divinity  Hall ;  six  if  he 
preferred  ta  be  a  rural  Divinity  student,  presenting  himself 
once  in  every  twelve  months  at  the  University  and  reading  a 
discourse.  He  did  not  wish  to  hasten  matters,  and,  the  pupil 
business  being  precarious,  and  the  mathematical  tutorship  at 
Annan  falling  vacant,  Carlyle  offered  for  it  and  was  elected 
by  competition *in  1814.  He  never  liked  teaching.  The  rec- 
ommendation of  the  place  was  the  sixty  or  seventy  pounds  a 
year  of  salary,  which  relieved  his  father  of  further  expense 
upon  him,  and  enabled  him  to  put  by  a  little  money  every 
year,  to  be  of  use  in  future  either  to  himself  or  his  family.  In 
other  respects  the  life  at  Annan  was  only  disagreeable  to  him. 
His  tutor's  work  he  did  scrupulously  well,  but  the  society  of 
a  country  town  had  no  interest  for  him.  He  would  not  visit 
He  lived  alone,  shutting  himself  up  with  his  books,  disliked 
the  business  more  and  more,  and  came  finally  to  hate  it.  An- 
nan had  indeed  but  one  recommendation — ^that  he  was  within 
reach  of  his  family,  especially  of  his  mother,  to  whom  he  was 
, attached  with  a  real  passion. 

His  father  had  by  this  time  given  up  business  at  Eccle- 
fechan,  and  had  taken  a  farm  in  the  neighborhood.  The 
Great  North  Road  which  runs  through  the  village  rises  grad- 
ually into  an  upland  treeless  grass  country.  About  two  mires 
distant  on  the  left-hand  side  as  you  go  towards  Lockerbf, 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMA  S  CARL  YLE,         505 

there  stands  arbout  three  hundred  yards  in  from  the  road,  a 
solitary  low  white-washed  house,  with  a  few  poor  outbuildings 
attached  to  it.  This  is  Mainhill,  which  was  now  for  many 
years  to  be  Carlyle's  home,  where  he  first  learned  German, 
studied  Faust  in  a  dry  ditch,  and  completed  his  translation  of 
Wilhelra  Meister.  The  house  itself  is,  or  was  when  the  Car- 
lyles  occupied  it,  of  one  story,  and  consisted  of  three  rooms, 
a  kitchen,  a  small  bed-room,  and  a  large  one  connected  by  a 
passage.  The  door  opens  into  a  square  farmyard,' on  one  side 
of  which  are  stables,  on  the  side  opposite  the  door  the  cow 
l^yre3,  on  the  third  a  washhouse  and  dairy.  The  situation  is 
high,  utterly  bleak  and  swept  by  all  the  winds.  Not  a  tree 
shelters  the  house  ;  the  fences  are  low,  the  wind  permitting 
nothing  to  grow  but  stunted  thorn.  The  view  alone  redeems 
the  dreariness  of  the  situation.  On  the  left  is  the  g^eat  hill 
of  Bumswark.  Annandale  stretches  in  front  down  to  the 
Solway,  which  shines  like  a  long  silver  riband ;  on  the  right 
is  Hoddam  Hill  with  the  Tower  of  Repentance  on  its  crest, 
and  the  wooded'slopes  which  mark  the  line  of  the  river.  Be- 
yond Hoddam  towers  up  Criffel,  and  in  the  far  distance 
Skiddaw,  and  Saddleback,  and  Helvellyn,  and  the  high  Cum- 
berland ridges  on  the  track  of  the  Roman  wall.  Here  lived 
Carlyle's  father  and  mother  with  their  eight  children,  Carlyle 
himself  spending  his  holidays  with  them  ;  the  old  man  and 
his  younger  sons  cultivating  the  sour  soil  and  winning  a 
hard-earned  living  out  of  it,  the  mother  and  daughters  doing 
the  household  work  and  minding  cows  and  poultry,  and  tak- 
ing- their  turn  in  the  field  with  the  rest  in  harvest  time. 

So  two  years  passed  away.  Of  Carlyle's  own  wiriting  during 
this  period  there  is  still  nothing  preserved;  but  his  corres- 
pondence continued,  and  from  these  letters  glimpses  can  be 
gathered  of  his  temper  and  occupations.  He  was  mainly  busy 
with  mathematics,  but  he  was  reading  incessantly,  Hume's 
Essays  among  other  books.  He  was  looking  out  into  the 
world,  meditating  on  the  fall  of  Napoleon,  on  the  French, 


So6 


THB"  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 


Revolution,  and  thinking  much  of  the  suffering  in  Scotland 
which  followed  the  close  of  the  war.  There  were  sarcastic 
sketches,  too,  of  the  families  with  which  he  was  thrown  in 
Annan  and  the  neighborhood.  Robert  Mitchell  (an  Edin- 
burgh student,  who  had  become  master  of  a  school  at  Ruth- 
well)  rallies  him  on  "  having  reduced  the  fair .  and  fat 
academicians  into  scorched,  singed,  and  shriveled  hags"; 
and  hinting  a  warning  '*  against  the  temper  with  respect  to 
this  world  which  we  are  sometimes  apt  to  entertain,"  he  sug- 
gests that  young  men  like  him  and  his  correspondent "  ought 
to  think  how  many  are  worse  off  than  they,"  "  should  be 
thankful  for  what  they  had,  and  should  not  allow  imagination 
to  create  unreal  distresses." 

To  another  friend,  Thomas  Murray,  author  afterwards  of  a 
history  of  Galloway,  Carlyle  had  complained  of  his  fate  in  a 
light  and  less  bitter  spirit.  To  ah  epistle  written  in  this  tone 
Murray  replied  with  a  description  of  Carlyle 's  style,  which 
deserves  a  place,  if  but  for  the  fulfillment  of  the  prophecy 
which  it  contains : — 

5  Carnbgib  Strebt,  July  ay,  1816? 

I  have  had  the  pleasure  of  receiving,  my  dear  Carlyle,  your  very  humorous  and 
friendly  letter,  a  letter  remarkable  for  vivacity,  a  Shandean  turn  of  expression,  and 
an  affectionate  pathos  which  indicate  a  peculiar  turn  of  mind,  make  sincerity  doubly 
striking  and  wit  doubly  poignant.  You  flatter  mc  with  saying  my  letter  was  good; 
but  allow  me  to  observe  that  among  all  my  elegant  and  respectable  correspondents 
there  is  none  whose  manner  of  letter-writing  I  so  much  envy  as  yours.  A  happy  flow 
of  language  cither  for  pathos,  description  or  humor,  and  an  easy,  graceful  current  of 
ideas  appropriate  to  every  subject,  characterize  your  style.  This  is  not  adulation ;  I 
$peak  what  1  think.  Your  letters  wiH  always  be  a  feast  to  me,  a  varied  and  exquisite 
repast  ;  and  the  time,  I  hope,  will  come,  but  I  trust  is  far  distant,  when  these  our 
juvenile  epistles  will  be  read  and  probably  applauded  by  a  generation  unborn,  and 
that  the  name  of  Carlyle,  at  least,  will  be  inseparably  connected  with  the  literary  his- 
tory of  the  nineteenth  century.  Generous  ambition  and  perseverance  will  overcome 
every  difiieulty,  and  our  great  Johnson  says,  *'  Where  much  is  attempted  something  is 
performed."  You  will,  perhaps,  recollect  that  when  I  conveyed  you  out  of  town  in 
April,  1814,  we  were  very  sentimental  :  we  said  that  few  knew  us,  and  still  fewer  took 
an  interest  in  us,  and  that  we  would  slip  through  the  world  inglorious  and  unknown. 
But  the  prospect  is  altered.  We  are  probably  as  well  known,  and  have  made  as  great 
a  figure,  as  any  of  the  same  standing  at  college,  and  we  do  not  know,  but  will  hope^ 
what  twenty  years  may  bring  forth. 

A  letter  from  you  every  fortnight  shall  be  answered  faithfully,  and  will  be  highly 
delightful ;  and  if  we  live  to  be  seniors,  the  letters  of  the  com^nions  of  our  youth 
will  call  tt>  mind  our  college  scenes,  endeared  to  us  by  many  teilder  aissociations,  acid 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE.         50/ 

will  make  us  forget  that  we  are  poor  and  old.  .  .  .  That  you  may  be  always  successful 
and  enjoy  every  happiness  that  this  evanescent  world  can  afford,  and  that  we  may 
meet  soon^  is,  my  dear  Carlyle,  the  sincere  wish  of 

Yours  most  faithfully, 

Thomas  Murray. 

These  college  companions  were  worthy  and  innocent  young 
men ;  none  of  thefn,  however,  came  to  much,  and  Carlyle's 
career  was  now  about  to  intersect  with  a  life  of  a  far  moi'e 
famous  contemporary  who  flamed  up  a  few  years  later  into 
meridian  splendor  and  then  disappeared  in  delirium.  Edward 
Irving  was  the  son  of  a  well-to-do  burgess  of  Annan,  by  pro- 
fession a  tanner,  Irving  was  five  years  older  than  Carlyle ; 
he  had  preceded  him  at  Annan  school.  He  had  gone  then  to 
Edinburgh  University,  where  he  had  specially  distinguished 
himself,  and  had  been  selected  afterwards  to  manage  a  school 
at  Haddington,  where  his  success  as  a  teacher  had  been 
again  conspicuous.  Among  his  pupils  at  Haddington  there 
was  one  gifted  little  girl  who  will  be  hereafter  much  heard  of 
in  these  pages,  Jane  Baillie  Welsh,  daughter  of  a  Dr.  Welsh, 
whose  surgical  fame  was  then  great  in  that  part  of  Scotland, 
a  remarkable  man  who  liked  Irving  and  trusted  his  only  child 
in  his  hands.  The  Haddington  adventure  had  answered  so 
well  that  Irving,  after  a  year  or  two,  was  removed  to  a  larger 
school  ^  Kirkcaldy,  where,  though  no  fault  was  found  with 
his  teaching,  he  gave  less  complete  satisfaction.  A  party 
among  his  patrons  there  t];iought  him  too  severe  with  the 
boys,  thought  him  proud,  thought  him  this  or  that  which  they 
did  not  like.  The  dissentients  resolved  at  last  to  have  a  sec- 
ond school  of  their  own  to  be  managed  in  a  different  fashion, 
and  they  applied  to  the  classical  and  mathematical  professors 
at  Edinburgh  to  recommend  them  a  master.  Professor  Chris- 
tieson  and  Professor  Leslie,  who  had  noticed  Carlyle  more 
than  he  was  aware  of,  had  decided  that  he  was  the  fittest  per- 
son that  they  knew  of;  and  in  the  summer  of  1816  notice  of 
the  offered  preferment  was  sent  down  to  him  at  Annan. 

He  had  seen   Irving's  face   occasionally  in  Ecclefechan 


508  '  TH^  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

church,  and  once  afterwards,  when  Irving,  fresh  from  his  col- 
lege distinctions,  had  looked  in  upon  Annan  school ;  but  they 
had  no  personal  acquaintance,  nor  did  Carlyle,  while  he  was 
a  master  there,  ever  visit  the  Irving  family.  Of  course,  how- 
ever, he  was  no  stranger  to  the  reputation  of  their  brilliant 
son,  with  whose  fame  all  Annandale  was  ringing,  and  with 
whom  kind  friends  had  compared  him  to  his  own  disadvan-^ 
tage. 

I  (he  says)  had  heard  much  of  Irving  all  along,  how  distinguished  in  studies^  how 
splendidly  successful  as  a  teacher,  how  two  professors  had  sent  him  out  to  Hadding- 
ton, and  how  his  new  academy  and  new  methods  were  iHumijnating.  a^d  astonishing 
everything  there.  I  don't  remember  any  malicious  envy  toward  this  great  Irving  of 
the  distance  for  his  greatness  in  study  and  learning.  I  certainly  might  have  had  a  ten- 
dency hadn*t  I  struggled  against  it,  and  tried  to  make,  it  emulation.  ''  Po  th^  Uke,  do 
the  like  under  difficulties." 

In  the  winter  of  1815  Carlyle  for  the  first  time  personally 
met  Irving,  and  the  beginning  of  the  acquaintance  was  not 
promising.  He  was  still  pursuing  his  Divinity  course.  Can- 
didates who  could  riot  attend  the  regular  lectures  at  the  Uni- 
versity came  up  once  a  year  and  delivered  an  address  of  some 
kind  in  the  Divinity  Hall.  One  already  he  had  given  in  the 
first  year  of  his  Annan  mastership — an  English  sermon  on  the 
text  **  Before  I  was  afflicted  I  went  astray,"  etc.  He  calls  it 
"a  weak,  flowery,  sentimental  piece,"  for  which,  however,  he 
had  l)een  complimented  "  by  comrades  and  professors."  His 
next  was  a  discourse  in  Latin  pn  the  question  whether  there 
was  or  was  not  such  a  thing  as  *'  Natural  Religion."  This,  too, 
he  says,  was  '*  weak  enough."  It  is  lost,  and  nothing  is  left 
to  show  the  view  which  he  took  about  the  matter.  But  here 
also  he  gave  satisfaction,  and  was  innocently  pleased  with 
himself.  It  was  on  this  occasion  that  he  fell  in  accidentally 
with  Irving  at  a  friend's  rooms  in  Edinburgh,  and  there  was  a 
trifling  skirmish  of  tongue  between  them,  where  Irving  foiind 
the  laugh  turned  against  him. 

A  few  months  after  came  Carlyle's  appointment  to  Kirk* 
caldy  as  Irving's  quasi  rival,  and  perhaps  he  felt  a  little  uneasy 
as  to  the  terms  on  which  they  might  stand  towards  ea<ih  otiier. 


,,     THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE,        5^9 

His  alarms,  however,  were  pleasantly  dispelled.  He  was  to 
go  to  Kirkcaldy  in  the  summer  holidays  of  1816  to  see  the 
people  there  and  be  seen  by  them  before  coming  to  a  final 
arrangement.  Adam  Hope,  one  of  the  masters  in  Annan 
school,  to  whom  Carlyle  was  much  attached,  and  whose  por- 
trait he  has  painted,  had  just  lost  his  wife.  Carlyle  had  gone 
to  sit  with  the  old  man  in  his  sorrows,  and  unexpectedly  fell 
in  with  Irving  there,  who  had  come  on  the  same  errand. 

If  (he  says)  I  had  been  in  doubts  about  his  reception  of  me,  he  quickly  and  forever 
ended  them  by  a  friendUness  which  on  wider  scenes  might  have  been  called  chivalrous. 
At  first  sight  he  heartily  sho<xk  my  hand,  welcomed  me  as  if  I  had  been  a^valued  old 
acquauntance,  almost  a  brother,  and  before  my  leaving  came  up  to  me  again  and  with 
the  frankest  cone  said,  *^  Vt>u  are  coming  to  Kirkcaldy  to  look  about  you  in  a  month 
or  two.  You  know  I  am  there ;  my  house  and  all  that  I  can  do  for  you  is  yours  ;  two 
Atinandale  people  must  not  be  strangers  in  Fife."  The  doubting  Thomas  durst  not 
quite  believe  all  this,  so  chivalrous  was  it,  but  felt  pleased  and  relieved  by  the  fine  and 
\  tone  of  it,  and  thought  to  himself,  "  Well,  it  would  be  pretty." 


To  Kirkcaldy,  then,  Carlyle  went  with  hopes  so  far  im- 
proved. How  Irving  kept  his  word  ;  how  warmly  he  received 
him ;  how  he  opened  his  house,  his  library,  his  heart  to  him  ; 
how  they  walked  and  talked  together  on  Kirkcaldy  sands  on 
the  summer  nights,  and  toured  together  in  holiday  time 
througl\the  Highlands;  how  Carlyle  found  in  him  a  most 
precious  and  affectionate  companion  at  the  most  critical 
period  of^his  life — all  this  Carlyle  has  himself  described.  The 
reader  will  find  it  for  himself  in  the  reminiscences  of  Edward 
Irving. 

Inring  (he  says)  was  four  years  my  senior,  the  facile  prtnceps  for  success  and  reputa^ 
tion  among  the  ^dinbui^h  students,  famed  mathematician,  famed  teacher,  first  at 
Haddington,  then  here  a  flourishing  man  whom  cross  fortune  was  beginning  to  nibble 
at.  He  received  me  with  open  arms,  and  was  a  brother  to  me  and  a  friend  there  an4 
elsew  here  afterwards— 4uch  friend  as  I  never  had  again  or  before  in  thb  world,  at  heart 
constant  till  he  died. 

I  am  tempted  to  fill  many  pages  with  extracted  pictures 
of  the  Kirkcaldy  life  as  Carlyle  has  drawn  them.  But  they 
can  be  read  in  their  place,  and  there  is  much  else  to  tell ;  my 
business  is  to  supply  what  is  left  untold,  rather  than  give 
again  what  has  been  told  already. 

Correspondence  with  his  family  had  commenced  and  was 


5IO  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

regularly  continued  from  the  day  when  Carlyle  went  first  to 
college.  The  letters,  however,  which  are  preserved  begin 
with  his  settlement  at  Kirkcaldy.  From  this  time  they  are 
constant,  regular,  and,  from  the  care  with  which  they  have 
been  kept  on  both  sides,  are  to  be  numbered  in  thousands. 
Father,  mother,  brothers,  sisters,  all  wrote  in  their  various 
styles,  and  all  received  answers.  They  were  "  a  clannish  folk  " 
holding  tight  together,  and  Carlyle  was  looked  up  to  as  the 
flower  of  the  whole  flock.  Of  these  letters  I  can  give  but  a 
few  here  and  there,  but  they  will  bring  before  the  eyes,  the 
Mainhill  farm,  and  all  that  was  going  on  there  in  a  sturdy, 
pious,  and  honorable  Annandale  peasant's  household.  Carlyle 
had  spent  his  Christmas  holidays,  1816-17  ^t  home  as  usual, 
and  had  returned  to  work. 

James  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle., 

Mainhill^  Feb.  xa,  18x7. 

Dear  Son,— I  embrace  this  opportunity  of  writing  you  a  few  lines  with  the  carxier,  as 
I  had  nothing  to  say  that  was  worth  postage,  having  written  to  you  largely  the  last 
time.  But  only  I  have  reason  to  be  thankful  that  I  can  still  tell  you  that  we  are  all  in 
good  health,  blessed  be  God  for  all  his  mercies  towards  us.  Yojir  mother  has  got  your 
stockings  ready  now,  and  I  think  there  are  a  few  pairs  of  very  good  on^.  Times  b 
very  bad  here  for  laborers — work  is  no  brisker  and  living  is  high.  There  have  been 
meetings  held  by  the  Lairds  and  farmers  to  assist  ohern  in  getting  meal.  They  propose 
to  take  all  the  meal  that  can  be  sold  in  the  parish  to  Ecclefechan,  for  which  they  shall 
have  full  price,  and  there  they  sign  another  paper  telling  how  much  money  they  will  give 
to  reduce  the  price.  The  charge  is  given  to  James  Bell,  Mr.  Miller,  and  William  Gkaham 
to  sell  it. 

Mr.  Lawson,  our  priest,  is  doing  very  well,  and  has  given  us  no  more  paraphrases; 
but  seems  to  please  every  person  that  hears  him,  and  indeed  he  is  well  attended  every 
day.  The  sacrament  is  to  be  the  first  Sabbath  of  March,  and  he  i$  visiting  his  people, 
but  has  not  reached  Mainhill.  Your  mother  was  very  anxious  to  have  the  house  done 
before  he  came,  or  else  she  said  she  would  mn  over  the  hill  and  hide  herself.  Sandy 
(Alexander  Carlyle,  the  second  son)  and  I  got  to  work  soon  after  you  went  away,  built 
partitions,  and  ceiled — a  good  floor  laid— and  indeed  it  is  very  dry  and  comfortable  at 
this  time,  and  we  are  very  snug  and  have  no  want  of  the  necessaries  of  life.  Our  crop 
is  as  good  as  I  expected,  and  our  sheep  and  all  our  cattle  living  and  doing  very  well. 
Your  mother  thought  to  have  written  to  you  ;  but  the  carrier  stopped  only  two  days 
at  home,  and  she  ^ing  a  very  slow  writer  could  not  get  it  done,  but  she  will  write  next 
opportunity.  I  add  no  more  but  your  mother's  compliments,  and  she  sends  you  half 
the  cheese  that  she  was  telling  you  about.  Say  in  your  next  how  your  brother  is  com-  * 
ing  on,  and  tell  us  when  it  is  done  and  we  will  send  you  more.  Write  soon  after  you 
receive  this,  and  tell  us  all  your  news  and  how  you  are  coming  on.  I  say  no  more,  but 
remain,  dear  son,  your  loving  father. 

Jambs  Oaklylb. 


'  THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE,        5  ^  ^ 
Thomas  Carfyle  to  Mrs,  Carlyle  {Matnhill), 

Kirkcaldy,  March  17,  1817. 

My  dear  Mother, — I  have  been  long  intending  to  write  you  a  line  or  two  in  order  to 
let  you  know  my  state  and  condition,  but  having  nothing  worth  writing  to  communicate 
I  have  put  it  off  from  time  to  time.  There  was  little  enjoyment  for  any  person  at 
Mamhill  when  I  was  there  last,  but  I  look  forward  to  the  ensuing  autumn,  when  I  hope 
to  have  the  happines  of  discussing  matters  with  you  as  we  were  wont  to  do  of  old.  It 
gives  me  pleasure  to  hear  that  the  bairns  are  at  school.  There  are  few-  things  in  this 
world  more  valuable  than  knowledge,  and  youth  is  the  period  for  acquiring  it.  With 
the  exception  of  the  religious  and  moral  instruction  which  I  had  the  happiness  of  re- 
ceiving from  my  parents,  and  which  I  humbly  trust  will  not  be  entirely  lost  upon  me, 
there  is  nothing  for  which  I  feel  more  grateful  than  for  the  education  which  they  have 
bestowed  upon  me.  Sandy  was  getting  fond  of  reading  when  he  went  away.  I  hope 
he  and  Aitken*  will  continue  their  operations  now  that  he  b  at  home.  There  cannot 
be  imagined  a  more  honest  way  of  employing  spare  hours. 

My  way  of  life  in  this  place  is  much  the  same  as  formerly.  The  school  is  doing 
pretty  well,  and  my  health  through  the  winter  has  been  uniformly  good-  I  have  little 
intexx:oarse  with  the  natives  here ;  yet  there  is  no  dryness  between  us.  We  are  always 
happy  to  meet  and  happy  to  part ;  but  their  society  is  not  very  val  uable  to  me,  and  my 
books  are  friends  that  never  fail  me.  Sometimes  I  see  the  minister  and  some  others  of 
them,  with  whom  I  am  very  well  satisfied,  and  Irving  and  I  are  very  friendly  ;  so  I  am 
never  wearied  or  at  a  loss  to  pass  the  time. 

I  had  designed  this  night  to  write  to  Aitken  about  his  books  and  studies,  but  I  will 
scarcely  have  time  to  say  anything.  There  b  a  book  for  him  in  the  box,  and  I  would 
have  sent  him  the  geometry,  but  it  was  not  to  be  had  in  the  town.  I  have  sent  you  a 
scarf  as  near  the  kind  as  Aitken*s  very  scanty  description  would  allow  me  to  come.  I 
hope  it  will  please  you.  It  is  as  good  as  any  that  the  merchant  had,  A  shawl  of  the 
same  materials  would  have  been  warmer,  but  I  had  no  authority  to  get  it.  Perhaps 
you  would  like  to  have  a  shawl  also.  If  you  will  tell  me  what  color  you  prefer,  I  will 
send  it  you  with  all  the  pleasure  in  the  world.  I  expect  to  hear  from  you  as  soon  as 
you  can  find  leisure.  You  must  be  very  minute  in  your  account  of  your  domestic  af- 
fairs. My  father  once  spoke  of  a  threshing  machine.  If  twenty  pounds  or  so  will 
help  him,  they  are  quite  ready  at  his  service. 

I  remain,  dear  mother,  your  affectionate  son, 

Thomas  Carlylb. 

Mrs.  Carlyle  could  barely  write  at  this  time.  She  taught 
hersejf  later  in  life  for  the  pleasure  of  communicating  with 
her  son,  between  whom  and  herself  there  existed  a  special 
and  passionate  attachment  of  a  quite  peculiar  kind.  She  was 
a  severe  Calvinist,  and  watched  with  the  most  affectionate 
anxiety  over  her  children's  spiritual  welfare,  her  eldest  boy's 
above  all.  The  hope  of  her  life  was  to  see  him  a  minister — 
a  "  priest "  she  would  have  called  it — and  she  was  already 
alarmed  to  know  that  he  had  no  inclination  that  way. 

*  John  Aitken  Carlyle,  the  third  son,  afterwards  known  as  John. 


S 1 2  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MAGAZINE. 

Mrs,  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle. 

Main  HILL,  June  xo,  18x7. 

Dear  Son, — I  take  this  opportunity  of  writing  you  a  few  lines,  as  you  will  get  it  free. 
I  long  to  have  a  craik,*  and  look  forward  to  August,  trusting  to  see  thee  once  more, 
but  in  hope  the  meantime.  Oh,  Tom,  mind  the  golden  season  of  youth,  and  remem- 
ber your  Creator  in  the  days  of  your  youth.  Seek  God  while  He  may  be  found.  Call 
upon  Him  while  He  is  near.  We  hear  that  the  world  by  wisdom  knew  not  God. 
Pray  for  His  presence  with  you,  and  His  counsel  to  guide  you.  Have  you  got  through 
the  Bible  yet  ?  If  you  have,  read  it  again.  I  hope  you  will  not  weary,  and  may  the 
Lord  open  your  understanding. 

I  have  no  news  to  tell  you,  but  thank  God  we  are  all  in  an  ordinary  way.  I  hope 
you  are  well.  I  thought  you  would  have  written  before  now.  I  received  your  present 
and  was  very  proud  of  it.  I  called  it  **  my  son's  venison."  Do  write  as  soon  as  this 
comes  to  hand  and  tell  us  all  your  news.  I  am  glad  you  are  so  contented  in  your 
place.  We  ought  all  be  thankful  for  our  places  in  these  distressing  times,  for  1  dare 
say  they  are  felt  keenly.  We  send  you  a  small  piece  of  ham  and  a  minding  of  butter, 
as  I  am  sure  yours  is  done  before  now.  Tell  us  about  it  in  your  next,  and  if  anything 
is  wanting. 

Good  night,  Tom,  for  it  b  a  very  stormy  night,  and  I  must  away  to  the  byre  to 
milk. 

Now,  Tom,  be  sure  to  tell  me  about  your  chapters.    No  more  from 

Your  old 

MiNNIB. 

The  letters  from  the  other  members  of  the  family  were  sent 
equally  regularly  whenever  there  was  an  opportunity,  and 
give  between  them  a  perfect  picture  of  heialthy  rustic  life  at 
the  Mainhill  farm — the  brothers  and  sisters  down  to  the  low- 
est all  hard  at  work,  the  little  ones  at  school,  the  elders 
plowing,  reaping,  tending  cattle,  or  minding  the  dairy,  and 
in  the  intervals  reading  history,  reading  Scott's  novels,  or 
even  trying  at  geometry,  which  was  then  Carlyle's  own 
favorite  study.  In  the  summer  of  181 7  the  mother  had  a 
severe  illness,  by  which  her  mind  was  affected.  It  was  neces- 
sary to  place  her  for  a  few  weeks  under  restraint  away  from 
home — a  step  no  doubt  just  and  necessary,  but  which  she 
never  wholly  forgave,  but  resented  in  her  own  humorous  way 
to  the  end  of  her  life.  The  disorder  passed  off,  however,  and 
never  returned. 

Meanwhile  Carlyle  was  less  completely  contented  with  his 
position  at  Kirkcaldy  than  he  had  let  his  mother  suppose. 
For    one    thing    he  hated  school masteri ng ;    he  would,  or 

*  Familiar  talk. 


i^r^A. 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMA  S  CARL  YLE,        5 1 3 

thought  he  would,  have  preferred  to  work  with  his  hands» 
and  except  Irving  he  had  scarcely  a  friend  in  the  place  for 
whom  he  cared.  His  occupation  shut  him  out  from  the  best 
kind  of  society,  which  there,  as  elsewhere,  had  its  exclusive 
rules.  He  was  received,  for  Irving's  sake,  in  the  family  of 
Mr.  Martin,  the  minister,  and  was  in  some  degree  of  intimacy  * 
there,  liking  Martin  himself,  and  to  some  extent,  but  not 
much,  his  wife  and  daughters,  to  one  of  whom  Irving  had  per- ' 
haps  too  precipitately  become  engaged.  There  were  others 
also— Mr.  Swan,  a  Kirkcaldy  merchant,  particularly — for  whom 
he  had  a  grateful  remembrance ;  but  it  is  clear,  both  from 
Irving's  letters  to  him  and  from  his  own  confession,  that  he  was 
not  popular  either  there  or  anywhere.  -  Shy  and  reserved  at 
one  moment,  atanother  sarcastically  self-asserting,  with  forces 
working  in  him  which  he  did  not  himself  understand,  and 
which  still  less  could  be  understood  by  others,  he  could 
neither  properly  accommodate  himself  to  the  tone  of  Scotch 
provincial  drawing-rooms,  nor  even  to  the  business  which  he 
had  specially  to  do.  A  man  of  genius  can  do  the  lowest  work 
as  well  as  the  highest;  but  genius  in  the  process  of  develop- 
ing, combined  with  an  irritable  nervous  system  and  a  fiercely 
impatient  temperament,  was  not  happily  occupied  in  teaching 
stupid  lads  the  elements  of  Latin  and  arithmetic.  Nor  were 
matters  mended  when  the  Town  Corporation,  who  were  his 
masters,  took  upon  them,  as  sometimes  happened,  to  instruct 
or  rebuke  him. 

Life,  however,  even  under  these  hard  circumstances,  was 
not  without  its  romance.  I  borrow  a  passage  from  the  "  Re- 
miniscences " : — 

The  Kirkcaldy  people  were  a  pleasant,  solid,  Tionest  kind  of  fellow  mortals,  some- 
thing of  quietly  fruitful,  of  good  old  Scotch  in  their  works  and  ways,  more  vernacular, 
peaceably  fixed  and  almost  genial  in  their  mode  of  life,  than  T  had  been  used  to  in  the 
border  home  land.  Fife  generally  we  liked.  Those  ancient  little  burghs  and  sea  vil- 
lages, with  their  poor  little  havens,  salt-pans  and  weather-beaten  bits  of  Cyclopean 
breakwaters,  and  rude  innocent  machineries,  are  still  kindly  to  me  to  think  of.  Kirk-> 
caldy  itself  had  many  looms,  had  Baltic  trade,  whale  fishery,  etc.,  and  was  a  solidly 
diligent  and  yet  by  no  means  a  panting,  pufiing,  or  in  any  way  gambling  "  Lang 
Town."  lu  flax-mill  machinery,  I  remember,  was  turned  mainly  by  wind ;  and  curi- 
L.   M.— 17 


5  14  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZINE. 

ous  blue-painted  wheels  with  oblique  vans  rose  from  many  roofs  for  that  end'.  We  aU, 
I  in  particular,  always  rather  liked  the  people,  though  from  the  distance  chiefly, 
chagrined  and  discouraged  by  the  sad  trade  one  had.  Some  hospitable  human  friends 
I  found,  and  these  were  at  intervals  a  fine  little  element ;  but  in  general  we  were  but 
onlookers,  the  one  real  society  our  books  and  our  few  selves.  Not  even  with  the 
bright  young  ladies  (which  was  a  sad  feature)  were  we  generally  on  speaking  terms. 
By  far  the.  brightest  and  cleverest,  however,  an  ex-pupil  of  Irving's,  and  genealogi- 
cally and  otherwise,  being  poorish  and  well-bred,  rather  an  alien  in  Kirkcaldy,  I  did  at 
last  make  some  acquaintance  with— at  Irving's  first,  I  think,  though  she  rarely  came 
tnither— -and  it  might  easily  have  been  more,  had  she  and  her  aunt  and  our  economics 
and  other  circumstances  liked.  She  was  of  the  fair-complexioned,  softly  elegant,  softly 
grave,  witty  and  comely  type,  and  had  a  good  deal  of  gracefulness,  intelligence,  and 
other  talent.  Irving,  too,  it  was  sometinfes  thought,  found  her  very  interesting,  could 
the  Miss  Martin  bonds  have  allowed,  which  they  never  would.  To  me,  who  had  only 
known  her  for  a  few  months,  and  who  within  a  twelve  or  fiftAn  months  saw  the  last 
of  her,  she  continued,  for  perhaps  three  years,  a  figure  hanging  more  or  less  in  my 
fancy,  on  the  usual  romantic,  or  latterly  quite  elegiac  and  silent  terms,  and  to  this  day 
there  is  in  ree  a  good  will  to  her,  a  candid  and  gentle  pity,  if  needed  at  all.  She  was 
of  the  Aberdeenshire  Gordons.  Margaret  Gordon,  bom  I  think  in  New  Brunswick, 
where  her  father,  probably  in  some  official  post,  had  died  young  and  poor ;  but  her 
accent  was  prettily  English^  and  her  voice  very  fine. 

An  aunt  (widow  in  Fife,  childless  with  limited  resources,  but  of  frugal,  cultivated 
turn  ;  a  lean,  proud,  elderly  dame,  once  a  Miss  Gordon  herself ;  sang  Scotch  songs  beau- 
tifully, and  talked  shrewd  Aberdeenish  in  accent  and  otherwise)  had  adopted  her  and 
brought  her  hither  over  seas ;  and  here,  as  Irving's  ex- pupil,  she  now,  cheery  though 
with  dim  outlooks,  was.  Irving  saw  her  again  in  Glasgow  one  summer's  touring,  etc. ; 
he  himself  accompanying  joyfully — not  joining,  so  I  understood,  in  the  retinue  of 
suitors  or  potential  suitors ;  rather  perhaps  indicating  gently  "  No,  I  must  not."  A 
year  or  sb  after  we  heard  the  fair  Margaret  had  married  some  rich  insignificant  Mr. 
Something,  who  afterwards  got  into  Parliament,  thence  out  to  ^*  Nova  Scotia*'  (or  so, 
as  governor,  and  I  heard  of  her  no  more,  except  that  lately  she  was  still  living  child- 
less as  the  "  dowager  lady,"  her  Mr.  Something  having  got  knighted  before  dying. 
Poor  Margaret !  I  saw  her  recognizable  to  me  here  in  her  London  time,  1840  or  so) 
twice ;  once  with  her  maid  in  Piccadilly  promenading— tittle  altered  ;  a  second  time 
that  same  year,  or  next,  on  horseback  both  of  us,  and  meeting  in  the  gate  of  Hyde 
Park,  when  her  eyes  (but  that  was  all)  said  to  me  almost  touchingly,  yes,  yes,  that  is 
you. 

Margaret  Gordon  was  the  original,  so  far  as  there  was  an 
original,  of  Blumine  in  Sartor  Resartus.  Two  letters  from 
her  remain  among  Carlyle's  papers,  which  showed  that  on 
both  sides  their  regard  for  each  other  had  found  expression. 
Circumstances,  however,  and  the  unpromising  appearance  of 
Carlyle's  situation  and  prospects,  forbade  an  engagement  be- 
tween them,  and  acquit  the  aunt  of  needless  harshness  in 
peremptorily  putting  an  end  to  their  acquaintance.  Miss 
Gordon  toolc  leave  of  him  as  a  **  sister'*  in  language  of  affec- 
tionate advice.  A  single  passage  may  be  quoted  to  show  how 
the  young  unknown  Kirkcaldy  schoolmaster  appeared  in  tbc^ 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  TIIOMA  S  CARL  YLE.         5^5 

eyes  of  the  high-born  lady  who  had  thus  for  a  moment 
crossed  his  path. 

And  DoWf  my  dear  friend,  a  long,  long  adieu  ;  one  advice,  and,  as  a  parting  one  con- 
sider, value  it.  Cultivate  the  milder  disposicioBS  of  your  heart.  Subdue  the  more 
extravagant  virions  of  the  brain.  In  time  your  abilities  must  be  known*  Among 
your  acquaintance  they  are  already  beheld  with  wonder  and  delight.  By  those  whose 
opinion  will  be  valuable,  they  hereafter  will  be  appreciated.  Genius  will  render  you 
great.  May  virtue  render  you  beloved  !  Remove  the  awful  distance  between  you 
and  ordinairy  men  by  kind  and  gentle  manner.  Deal  gently  with  their  inferiority,  and 
be  convinced  they  will  respect  you  as  much  and  like  you  more.  Why  conceal  the 
real  goodness  that  flows  in  your  heart  ?  I  have  ventured  this  counsel  from  an  anxiety 
for  your  future  welfare,  and  I  would  enforce  it  with  all  the  earnestness  of  the  most 
sincere  friendship.  Let  your  light  shine  before  men,  and  think  them  not  unworthy 
the  trouble.  This  exercise  will  prove  its  own  reward.  It  must  be  a  pleasing  thing  to 
live  in  the  affections  of  others.  Again  adieu.  Pardon  the  freedom  I  have  used,  and 
when  you  think  of  me  be  it  as  of  a  kind  sister,  to  whom  your  happiness  will  always 
yield  delight,  and  your  griefs  sorrow. 

Yours,  with  esteem  and  regard, 

M. 

I  give  ypu  not  my  address  because  I  dare  not  promise  to  see  you. 

Carlyle  had  by  this  time  abandoned  the  "  ministry  "  as  his 
possible  future  profession — not  without  a  struggle,  for  both 
his  father's  and  his  mother's  hearts  had  been  set  upon  it;  but 
the  "grave  prohibitive  doubts  "  which  had  risen  in  him  of 
their  own  accord  had  been  strengthened  by  Gibbon,  whom  he 
had  found  in  Irving's  library,  and  had  eagerly  devoured. 
Never  at  any  time  had  he  "  the  least  inclination  "  for  such  an 
office,  and  his  father,  though  deeply  disappointed,  was  too 
wise  a  man  to  remonstrate.*  The  "  schoolmastering "  too, 
after  two  years'  experience  of  it,  became  intolerable.  His 
disposition,  at  once  shy  and  defiantly  proud,  had  perplexed 
and  displeased  the  Kirkcaldy  burghers.     Both  he  and  Irving 

*  **  With  me,**  be  says  in  a  private  note,  **  it  wa=j  never  much  in  favor,  though  my 
parents  silently  much  wished  it,  as  1  knew  well.  Finding  I  had  objections,  my  father, 
with  a  magnanimity  which  I  admired  and  admire,  left  me  frankly  to  my  own  guidance 
in  that  matter,  as  did  my  mother,  perhaps  still  more  lovingly,  though  not  so  silently ; 
and  the  theological  course  which  could  be  prosecuted  or  kept  open  by  appearing  ah- 
nually,  putting  down  your  name,  but  with  some  trifling  fee,  in  the  register,  and  then 
going  your  way,  was,  after  perhaps  two  years  of  this  languid  form,  allowed  to  close 
itself  for  good.  I  remember  yet  being  on  the  street  in  Argyll  Square,  Edinburgh, 
probably  in  1817,  and  come  over  from  Kirkcaldy  with  some  intent,  the  languidest 
possible,  still  to  put  down  my  name  and  fee.  The  official  person,  when  I  rung,  was 
not  at  home,  and  my  instant  feeling  was,  *  Very  good,  then,  very  good  ;  let  this  be 
Finis  in  the  matter,'  and  it  really  was.— T.  C.** 


Si6 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 


fell  into  unpleasant  collisions  with  their  employers,  antj 
neither  of  them  was  sufficiently  docile  to  submit  to  reproof. 
An  opposition  school  had  been  set  up  which  drew  off  the 
pupils,  and  finally  they  both  concluded  that  they  had  h^d 
enough  of  it — **  better  die  than  be  a  schoolmaster  for  one's 
living" — and  would  seek  some  other  means  of  supporting 
themselves.  Carlyle  had  passed  his  summer  holidays  as 
usual  at  Mainhill  (1818),  where  he  had  perhaps  talked  over 
his  prospects  with  his  family.  On  his  return  to  Kirkcaldy  in 
September  he  wrote  to  his  father  explaining  his  situation. 
He  had  saved  about  £/)0,  on  which,  with  his  thrifty  habits,  he 
said  that  he  could  support  himself  in  Edinburgh  till  he  could 
"  fall  into  some  other  way  of  doing."  He  could  perhaps  get 
a  few  mathematical  pupils,  and  meantime  could  study  for  the 
bar.  He  waited  only  for  his  father's  approval  to  send  in  his 
resignation.  The  letter  was  accompanied  by  one  of  his  con- 
stant presents  to  his  mother,  who  was  again  at  home,  though 
not  yet  fully  recovered. 

John  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

Mainhill,  September  i6,  t8x8. 
Dear  Brother, — We  received  yours,  and  it  told  us  of  your  safe  arrival  at  Kirkcaldy. 
Our  mother  has  grown  better  every  day  since  you  left  us.  She  is  as  steady  as  ever  she 
was,  has  been  upon  haystacks  three  or  four  times'  and  has  been  at  churcli  every  Sab- 
bath since  she  came  home,  behaving  always  very  decently.  Also,  she  has  given  over 
talking  and  singing,  and  spends  some  of  her  time  consulting  Ralph  Erskine.  She 
sleeps  every  night,  and  hinders  no  person  to  sleep,  but  can  do  with  less  than  the  gen- 
erality of  people.  In  fact  we  may  conclude  that  she  is  as  wise  as  could  be  expected. 
She  has  none  of  the  hypocritical  mask  with  which  some  people  clorbe  their  senti- 
ments. One  day,  having  met  Agg  Byers,  she  says :  "  Weel,  Agg,  lass,  I've  never 
spoken  t'ye  sin  ye  stole  our  coals.     1*11  gi^:  ye  an  advice :  never  steal  nae  more.*' 

Alexander  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

September  18,  1818. 
My  dear  Brother, — ^We  were  glad  to  hear  of  your  having  arrived  in  safety,  though 
your  prospects  were  not  brilliant.  My  father  is  at  Ecclefechan  to-day  at  a  market, 
but  before  he  went  he  told  me  to  mention  that  with  regard  to  his  advising  you,  he  Wse 
unable  to  give  you  any  advice.  He  thought  it  might  be  necessary  to  consult  Leslie 
before  you  gave  up,  but  you  might  do  what  seemed  to  you  good.  Had  my  ftdvice  any 
weight,  I  would  advise  you  to  try  the  law.  You  may  think  you  have  not  moBcy 
enough  to  try  that,  but  with  what  assistance  we  could  make,  and  your  own  industry,  I 
think  there  would  be  no  fear  but  you  would  succeed.  The  box  which  contjuned  my 
mother's  bonnet  came  a  day  or  two  ago.  She  is  very  well  pleased  with  it,  though  WSi 
father  thought  it  too  gaudy ;  but  she  purposes  writing  to  you  herself*  . 


,^       THE  EARL  Y  LITE  OF  THOMA  S  CARL  YLE.  5 1 7 

The  end  was,  that,  when  December  came,  Carlyle  and  Irv- 
ing- **  kicked  the  schoolmaster  functions  over,"  removed  to 
Edinburgh,  and  were  adrift  on  the  world.  Irving  had  little  to 
fear:  he  had  money,  friends,  reputation  ;  he  had  a  profession, 
and  was  waiting  only  for  **  a  call  "  to  enter  on  his  full  privi- 
leges. Carlyle  was  far  more  unfavorably  situated.  He  was 
poor,  uhpopular,  comparatively  unknown,  or,  if  known,  known 
only  to  be  feared  and  even  shunned.  In  Edinburgh  "  from  my 
fellow  creatures,"  he  says,  "  little  or  nothing  but  vinegar  was 
my  reception  when  we  happened  to  meet  or  pass  near  each 
other— my  own  blame  mainly,  so  proud,  shy,  poor,  at  once  so 
insignificant-looking,  and  so  grim  and  sorrowful.  That  in 
Sartor  of  the  worm  trodden  on  and  proving  a  torped6  is  not 
wholly  a  fable,  but  did  actually  befall  once  o  r  twice,  as  I  still 
with-^a  kind  of  small,  not  ungenial,  malice  can  remember." 
He  had,  however,  as  was  said,  nearly  a  hundred  pounds,  which 
he  had  saved  out  of  his  earnings ;  he  had  a  consciousness  of 
integrity  worth  more  than  gold  to  him.  He  had  thrifty,  self- 
denying  habits  which  made  him  content  with  the  barest 
necessaries,  and  he  resolutely  faced  his  position.  His  family, 
though  silently  disapproving  the  step  which  he  had  taken, 
and  necessarily  anxious  about  him,  rendered  what  help  they 
could.  Once  more  the  Ecclefechan  carrier  brought  up  the 
weekly  or  monthly  supplies  of  oatmeal,  cakes,  butter,  and, 
when  needed,  under-garments,  returning  with  the  dirty  linen 
for  the  mother  to  wash  and  mend,  and  occasional  presents 
which  were  never  forgotten  ;  while  Carlyle,  after  a  thought 
of  civil  engineering,  for  which  his  mathematical  training  gave 
him  a  passing  inclination,  sate  down  seriously,  if  not  very  as- 
siduously, to  study  law.  Letters  to  and  from  Ecclefechan 
were  constant,  the  carrier  acting  as  postman.  Selections  from 
them  bring  the  scene  and  characters  before  the  reader's  eyes. 
Sister  Mary,  then  twelve  years  old,  writes : — 

I  talec  the  opportunity  of  sending  you  this  scrawl.  I  got  the  hat  you  sent  with 
Sandy  (brother  Alexander),  and  it  fits  very  well.  It  was  far  too  good ;  a  worse  would 
have  done  very  well.    Boys  and  I  are  employed  this  winter  in  waiting  on  the  cattle, 


S'lS       .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

and  are  ^ing  on  very  well  at  present.  I  generally  write  a  copy  every  night,  and  read 
a  little  in  the  "Cottagers  of  Glenburnie,"  or  some  such  like  ;  and  it  shall  be  my  earn- 
est desire  never  to  imitate  the  abominable  slutteries  of  Mrs.  Maclarly.  .The  remarks  of 
the  author,  Mrs.  Hamilton,  often  bring  your  neat  ways  in  my  mind,  and  I  hope  to  be 
benefited  by  them.  In  the  meantime,  I  shall  endeavor  to  be  a  good  girl,  to  be  kind 
and  obedient  to  my  parents,  and  obliging  to  ray  brothers' and  sisters.  You  will  write 
me  a  long  letter  when  the  carrier  comes  back.  n 

The  mother  was  unwearied  in  her  affectionate  solicitude- 
solicitude  for  the  eternal  as  well  as  temporal  interests  of  her 
darling  child. 

Mrs.  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

Mainhill,  January  3, 1819. 
Dear  Son, — I  received  yours  in  due  time,  and  was  glad  to  hear  you  were  weH.  I 
hope  you  will  be  healthier,  moving  about  in  the  city,  than  in  your  former  way.  Health 
is  a  valuable  privilege ;  try  to  improve  it,  then.  The  time  is  short.  Another  year  has 
commenced.  Time  is  on  the  wing,  and  flies  swiftly.  Seek  God  with  all  your  heart, 
and  oh,  my  dear  son,  cease  not  to  pray  for  Hb  counsel  in  all  your  ways.  Fear  not  the 
world  ;  you  will  be  provided  for  as  He  sees  meet  for  you. 

As  a  sincere  friend,  whom  you  are  always  dear  to,  I  beg  you  do  not  neglect  reading 
a  part  of  your  Bible  daily,  and  may  the  Lord  open  your  eyes  to  see  wondrous  thingS) 
out  of  His  law !  But  it  is  now  two  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  a  bad  pen,  bad  ink, 
and  I  as  bad  at  writing.    I  will  drop  it,  and  add  no  more,  but  remain 

Your  loving  mother, 

Peggie  Carlyle. 

Carlyle  had  written  a  sermon  on  the  salutary  effects  of  **  af- 
fliction," as  his  first  exercise  in  the  Divinity  School.  He  was 
beginning  now,  in  addition  to  the  problem  of  living  which  he 
had  to  solve,  to  learn  what  affliction  meant.  He  was  attacked 
with  dyspepsia,  which  never  wholly  left  him,  and  in  these  early- 
years  soon  assumed  its  most  torturing  form  like  "  a  rat  gnaw- 
ing at  the  pit  of  his  stomach  " ;  his  natural  irritability  found 
escape  in  expressions  which  showed  that  he  was  already 
attaining  a  mastery  of  language,  The  noises  of  Edinburg^h 
drove  him  wild  and  opened  the  sluices  of  his  denunciatory- 
eloquence. 

I  find  living  here  very  high  (he  wrote  soon  after  he  was  settled  in  his  lodgings).  An 
hour  ago  I  paid  my  week's  bill,  which,  though  15^.  -xd.y  was  the  smallest  of  the  three 
'  I  have  yet  discharged.  This  is  an  unreasonable  sum,  when  I  consider  the  slender  ac- 
commodation and  the  paltry,  ill-cooked  morsel  which  is  my  daily  pittance.  There  is 
also  a  schoolmaster  right  overhead,  whose  noisy  brats  give  me  at  times  no  small  an- 
noyance.  On  a  given  night  of  the  week  he  also  assembles  a  select  number  of  vocal 
performers,  whose  music,  as  they  charitably  name  it,  is  now  and  then  so  clamorous 
that  I  almost  wished  the  throats  of  these  sweet  singers  full  of  molten  lead,  or  any 
other  substance  that  would  stop  their  braying. 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE.         S  I9 

But  he  was  not  losing  heart,  and  he  liked,  so  far  as  had  seen 
into  it,  his  new  profession : — 

The  law  (he  told  his  mother)  is  that  I  sometimes  think  I  was  intended  for  naturally. 
I  am  afraid  it  takes  several  hundreds  to  become  an  advocate.  But  for  this  I  should^ 
commence  the  study  of  it  with  great  hopes  of  success.  We  shall  see  whether  it  is  possible. 
One  of  the  first  advocates  of  the  day  raised  himself  from  being  a  disconsolate  preacher 
to  his  present  eminence.  Therefore  I  entreat  you  not  tobe  uneasy  about  me.  I  see 
none  of  my  fellows  with  whom  I  am  very  anxious  to  change  places.  Tell  the  boys  not 
to  let  their  hearts  be  troubled  for  me.  I  am  a  stubborn  dog,  and  'evil  fortune  shall  not 
break  my  heart  or  bend  it  either,  as  I  hope.  I  know  not  how  to  speak  about  the 
washing  which  you  offer  so  kindly.  Surely  you  thought,  five  years  ago,  that  this 
troublesome  washing  and  baking  was  all  over ;  and  now  to  recommence !  I  can 
scarcely  think  of  troubling  you  ;  yet  the  clothes  af-e  ill-washed  here ;  and  if  the  box  be 
going  and  coming  any  way,  perhaps  you  can  manage  it." 

While  law  lectures  were  being  attended,  the  problem  was 
how  to  live.  Pupils  were  a  poor  resource,  and  of  his  adven- 
tures in  this  department  Carlyle  gave  ridiculous  accounts.  In 
February,  18 19,  he  wrote  to  his  brother  John : — 

About  a  week  ago  I  briefly  dismissed  an  hour  of  private  teaching.  A  man  in  the 
New  Town  applied  to  one  Nichol,  public  teacher  of  mathematics  here,  for  a  person  to 
give  instruction  in  arithmetic,  or  something  of  that  sort.  Nichol  spoke  of  me,  and  I 
was  in  consequence  directed  to  call  on  the  man  next  morning.  I  went  at  the  appointed 
hoiir,  and  after  waiting  for  a  few  minutes  was  met  by  a  stout,  impudent-looking  man 
with  red  whiskers,  having  much  the  air  of  an  attorney,  or  some  such  creature  of  that 
sort.  As  our  conversation  may  give  you  some  insight  into  these  matters,  I  report  the 
substance  of  it.  "  I  am  here,**  I  said,  after  making  a  slight  bow,  which  was  just  per- 
ceptibly returned,  '*by.the  request  of  Mr.  Nichol,  to  speak  with  you,  sir,  about  a 
mathematical  teacher  whom  he  tells  me  you  want."  "  Aye.  What  are  your  terms  ?  " 
"Two  guineas  a  month  for  each  hour."  "Two  guineas  a  month  !  that  is  perfectly 
extravagant.*'  **  I  believe  it  to  be  the  rate  at  which  every  teacher  of  respectability  in 
Edinburgh  officiates,  and  I  know  it  to  be  the  rate  below  which  I  never  officiate.*' 
"  That  will-not  do  for  my  friend  "  '*  I  am  sorry  that  nothing  else  will  do  for  me  ; " 
and  I  retired  with  considerable  deliberation. 

Other  attempts  were  not  so  unsuccessful ;  one,  sometimes 
two,  pupils  were  found  willing  to  pay  at  the  rate  required. 
Dr.  Brewster,  afterwards  Sir  David,  discovered  Carlyle  and  , 
gave  him  employment  on  his  Encyclopaedia.  He  was  thus 
able  to  earn,  as  long  as  the  session  lasted,  about  two  pounds 
a  week,  and  on  this  he  contrived  to  live  without  trenching  on 
his  capital.  His  chief  pleasure  was  his  correspondence  with 
his  mother,  which  never  slackened.  She  had  written  to  tell 
him  of  the  death  of  her  sister  Mary.     He  replies : — 

Edinburgh,  Monday,  March  29, 1819. 
My  dear  Mother, — I  am  so  much  obliged  to  you  for  the  aifectiooate  concern  which 


5  20  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

you  express  for  me  in  that  long  letter-  that  I  cannot  delay  to  send  you  a  few  brief 
words  by  way  of  reply.  I  was  affected  by  the  short  notice  you  give  me  of  Aunt 
Mary's  death,  and  the  short  reflections  with  which  you  close  it.  It  is  true,  my  dear 
mother,  '*  that  we  must  all  soon  follow  her,"  such  is  the  unalterable  and  not  unpleas- 
ing  doom  of  men.  Then  it  is  well  for  those  who,  at  that  awful  moment  which  is  before 
every^one,  shall  be  able  to  took  back  with  calmness  and  forward  with  hope.  But  I 
need  not  dwell  upon  this  solemn  subject.  It  is  familiar  to  the  thoughts  of  every  one 
who  has  any  thought. 

I  am  rather  afraid  I  have  not  been  quite  regular  in  reading  that  best  of  books  whu^ 
you  recommended  tame.  However,  last  night  I  was  reading  upon  my  favorite  Job, 
and  I  hope  to  do  better  in  time  to  come.  I  entreat  you  to  believe  that  I  am  sincerely 
desirbus  of  being  a  good  man  ;  and  though  we  may  differ  in  some  few  unimportant 
particulars,  yet  I  firmly  trust  that  ^the  same  power  which  created  us  with  imperfect 
faculties  will  pardon  the  errors  of  every  one  (and  none  are  without  them)  who  seeks 
truth  and  righteousness  with  a  simple  heart. 

You  need  not  fear  my  studying  too  much.  In  fact,  my  prospects  are  so  unsettled 
that  I  do  not  often  sit  down  to  books  with  all  the  zeal  I  am  capable  of.  You  are  not 
to  think  I  am  fretful.  I  have  long  accustomed  my  mind  to  look  upon  the  future  witH 
a  sedate  aspect,  and  at  any  rate  my  hopes  have  never  yet  failed  me.  A  French  author, 
D'Alembert  (one  of  the  few  persons  who  deserve  the  honorable  epithet  of  honest  man), 
whom  I  was  lately  reading,  remarks  that  one  who  devoted  his  life  to  learning  ought 
to  carry  for  his  motto, ''  Liberty,  Truth,  Poverty,"  for  he  that  fears  the  latter  can 
never  have  the  former.  This  should  not  prevent  one  from  using  every  honest  effort 
to  attain  a  comfortable  situation  in  life ;  it  says  only  that  the  best  is  dearly  bought  \xy 
base  conduct,  and  the  worst  is  not  worth  mourning  over.  We  shall  speak  of  all  these 
matters  more  fully  in  summer,  for  I  am  meditating  just  now  to  come  down  to  stay  a 
while  with  you,  accompanied  with  a  cargo  of  books,  Italian,  German,  and  others.  You 
will  give  me  yonder  little  room,  and  you  will  waken  rae  every  morning  about  five  or 
six  o'clock.  Then  suck  study.  I  shall  delve  in  the  garden  too,  and,  in  a  word,  become 
not  only  the  wisest  but  the  strongest  man  in  those  regions.  This  is  all  clover^  but  it 
pleases  one. 

My  dear  mother,  yours  most  affectionately, 

Thomas  Cablvue. 

D'Alembert's  name  had  probably  never  reached  Annandale, 
and  Mrs.  Carlyle  could  not  gather  from  it  into  what  perilous 
regions  her  son  was  traveling — but  her  quick  ear  caught 
something  in  the  tone  which  frightened  her. 

Oh,  my  dear,  dear  son  (she  answered  at  once  and  eagerly),  I  would  pray  for  a  bless- 
ing on  your  learning.  I  beg  you  with  all  the  feeling  of  an  affectionate  mother  that 
you  would  study  the  Word  of  God,  which  he  has  graciously  put  in  our  hands,  that  it 
may  powerfully  reach  our  hearts,  that  we  may  discern  it  in  its  true  light.  God  made 
man  after  His  own  image,  therefore  he  behoved  to  be  without  any  imperfect  facult^s. 
Beware,  my  dear  son,  of  such  thoughts  ;  let  them  not  dwell  on  your  mind.  God  for- 
bid !  But  I  dare  say  you  will  not  care  to  read  this  scrawl.  Do  make  religion  your  great 
study,  Tom ;  if  you  repent  it,  I  will  bear  the  blame  for  ever. 

Carlyle  was  thinking  as  much  as  his  mother  of  religion,  1 
the  form  in  which  his  thoughts  were  running  was  not  h^ 
He  was  painfully  seeing  that  all  things  were  not  wholly  ap^W 


THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF  THOMA S  CARL  YLE,'  5^1 

had  been  taught  to  think  of  them ;  the  doubts  which  had 
stopped  his  divinity  career  were  blackening^  into  thunder- 
clouds; and  all  his  reflections  were  colored  by  dyspepsia. 
"I  was  entirely  unknown  in  Edinburgh  circles/'  he  says, 
"  solitary,  eating  my  own  heart,  fast  losing  my  health  too,  a 
prey  to  nameless  struggles  and  miseries,  which  have  yet  a 
kind  of  horror  in  them  to  my  thoughts,  three  weeks  without 
any  kind  of  sleep  from  impossibility  to  be  free  of  noise."  In 
fact  he  was  entering  on  what  he  called  "  the  three  most  miser- 
able years  of  my  life.'  He  would  have  been  saved  from  much 
could  he  have  resolutely  thrown  himself  into  his  intended 
profession ;  but  he  hated  it,  as  just  then,  perhaps,  he  would 
have  hated  anything. 

I  had  thought  (he  writes  in  a  note  somewhere)  of  attempting  to  become  an  advocate. 
It  seemed  glorious  to  me  for  its  independency,  and  I  did  read  some  law  books,  attend 
Hume's  lectures  on  Scotch  law,  and  converse  with  and  question  various  dull  people  of 
thf  practical  sort.  But  it  and  they  and  the  admired  lecturing  tf  ume  himself  appeared 
CO  me  mere  deAizens  of  the  kingdom  of  dullness,  pointing  towards  nothing  but  money 
as  wages  for  all  that  bogppol  of  disgust.  Hume*s  lectures  once  donewith,  I  flung  the 
thing  away  for  ever. 

Men  who  are  out  of  humor  with  themselves  see  their  con- 
dition reflected  in  the  world  outside  them,  and  everything 
seems  amiss  because  it  is  not  well  with  themselves.  But  the 
state  of  Scotland  and  England  also  was  fitted  to  feed  his  dis- 
content. The  great  war  had  been  followed  by  a  collapse. 
Wages  were  low,  food  at  famine  prices.  Tens  of  thousands 
of  artisans  were  out  of  work,  their  families  were  starving, 
?ind  they  themselves  were  growing  mutinous.  Even  at  home 
from  his  own  sternly  patient  father  who  never  meddled  with 
pohtics,  he  heard  things  not  calculated  to  reconcile  him  to 
existing  arrangements. 

I  have  heard  my  father  say  (he  mentions),  with  an  impressiveness  which  all  his  pcr- 
ception»  carried  with  them,  that  the  lot  of  a  poor  man  was  growing  worse,  that  the 
world  would  not,  and  could  not,  last  as  it  was,  but  mighty  changes,  of  which  none  saw 
the  end,  were  on  the  way.  In  the  dear  years  when  the  oatmeal  was  as  high  as  ten 
shillings  a  stone,  he  had  noticed  the  laborers,  I  have  heard  him  tell,  retire  each  sepa- 
rately to  a  brook  and  there  drink  instead  of  dining,  anxious  only  to  hide  it. 

These  early  impressions  can  be  traced  through  the  whole 
of  Carlyle's  writings,  the  conviction  being  forced  upon  him 


522  THE' LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

that  there  was  something  vicious  to  the  bottom  in  English 
and  Scotch  society,  and  that  revolution  in  some  form  or  other 
lay  visibly  ahead.  So  long  as  Irving  remained  in  Edinburgh 
"  the  condition  of  the  people  "  question  was  the  constant  sub- 
ject of  talk  between  him  and  Carlyle.  They  were  both  of 
them  ardent,  radical,  indignant  at  the  injustice  which  they 
witnessed,  and  as  yet  unconscious  of  the  difficulty  of  mending- 
it.  Irving,  however,  Carlyle  had  seen  little  of  since  they  had 
moved  to  Edinburgh,  and  he  was  left,  for  the  most  part,  alone 
with  his  own  thoughts.  There  had  come  upon  him  the  trials 
which  in  these  days  awaits  every  man  of  high  intellectual 
gifts  and  noble  nature  on  his  first  actual  acquaintance  witli 
human  things — ^the  question,  far  deeper  than  any  mere  political 
one.  What  is  this  world  then,  what  is  this  human  life,  over 
which  a  just  God  is  said  to  preside,  but  of  whose  presence  or 
whose  providence  so  few  signs  are  visible  ?  In  happier  ages 
religion  silences  skepticism  if  it  cannot  reply  to  its  difficulties, 
and  postpones  the  solution  of  the  mystery  to  another  stage 
of  existence.  Brought  up  in  a  pious  family,  where  religion  was- 
not  talked  about  or  emotionalized,  but  was  accepted  as  the 
rule  of  thought  and  conduct,  himself  too  instinctively  up- 
right, pure  of  heart,  and  reverent,  Carlyle,  like  his  parents, 
had  accepted  the  Bible  as  a  direct  communication  from 
Heaven.  It  made  known  the  will  of  God,  and  the  relations 
in  which  man  stood  to  his  Maker,  as  a  present  fact,  the  truth 
of  it,  like  the  truth  of  gravitation,  which  man  must  act  upon 
or  immediately  suffer  the  consequences.  But  religion,  as  re- 
vealed in  the  Bible,  passes  beyond  present  conduct,  pene- 
trates all  forms  of  thought,  and  takes  possession  wherever  it 
goes.  It  claims  to  control  the  intellect,  to  explain  the  past 
and  foretell  the  future.  It  has  entered  into  poetry  and  art. 
and  has  been  the  interpreter  of  history.  And  thus  th^e  had 
grown  round  it  a  body  of  opinion  on  all  varieties  of  sue 
assumed  to  be  authoritative ;  dogmas  which  science  was  c^ 
•^^radicting ;  a  history  of  events  which  it  called  infallible,  ye^. 


THE  EAHLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE,        $23 

which  the  canons  of  evidence,  by  which  other  histories  are 
tried  and  tested  successfully,  declared  not  to  be  infallible  at 
all.  In  the  Mainhill  household  the  Westminster  Confession 
was  a  full  and  complete  account  of  the  position  of  mankind 
and  of  the  Being  to  whom  they  owed  their  existence.  For 
Carlyle's  father  and  mother  this  Old  and  New  Testament  not 
only  cojitainejd  all  spiritual  truth  necessary  for  guidance  in 
word  and  deed,  but  every  fact  related  in  them  was  literally 
true.  To  doubt  was  not  to  mistake,  but  was  to  commit  a  sin 
of  the  deepest  dye,  and  was  a  sure  sign  of  a  corrupted  heart. 
His  own  wide  study  of  modern  literature  had  shown  him  that 
much  of  this  had  appeared  to  many  of  the  strongest  minds  in 
Europe  to  be  doubtful  or  even  plainly  incredible.  Young 
n;^n  of  genius  are  the  first  to  feel  the  growing  influences  of 
their  time,  and  on  Carlyle  they  fell  in  their  most  painful  form. 
With  his  pride,  he  was  most  modest  and  self-distrustful.  He 
had  been  taught  that  want  of  faith  was  sin,  yet,  like  a  true 
Scot,  he  knew  that  he  would  peril  his  soul  if  he  pretended  to 
believe  what  his  intellect  told  him  was  false.  If  any  part  of 
what  was  called  ReVelation  was  mistaken,  how  could  he  be 
assured  of  the  rest  ?  How  could  he  tell  that  the  moral  part 
of  it^to  which  the  phenomena  which  he  saw  round  him  were  in 
plain  contradiction,  was  more  than  a  "  devout  imagination  *'  } 
Thus  in  the  midst  of  his  poverty  and  dyspepsia  there  had 
come  upon  him  the  struggle  which  is  always  hardest  in  the 
noblest  minds,  which  Job  had  known,  and  David,  and  Solo- 
mon, and  -^schylus,  and  Shakespeare,  and  Goethe.  Where 
are  the  tokens  of  His  presence  ?  where  are  the  signs  of  His 
coining?  Is  there,  in  this  universe  of  things,  any  moral 
Providence  at  all  ?  or  is  it  the  product  of  some  force  of  the 
nature  of  which  we  can  know  nothing,  save  only  that  "  one 
event  comes  alike  to  all,  to  the  good  and  to  the  evil,  and  that 
there  is  no  difference  "  ? 

Commonplace  persons,  if   assailed    by  such    misgivings, 
thrust  them  aside,  throw  themselves  into  outward  work,  and 


524  TffE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

leave  doubt  to  settle  itself.  Carlyle  could  not.  The  impof- 
tunacy  of  the  overwhelming  problem  forbade  him  to  settle 
himself  either  to  law  or  any  other  business  till  he  had  wres- 
tled down  the  misgivings  which  had  grappled  with  him:  The 
greatest  of  us  have  our  weaknesses,  and  the  Margaret  Gordon 
business  perhaps  intertwined  itself  with  the  spiritual  torment- 
The  result  of  it  was  that  Carlyle  was  extremely  miserable. 
*'  tortured/'  as  he  says,  "  by  the  freaks  of  an  imagination  of 
extraordinary  and  wild  activity." 

He  went  home,  as  he  had  proposed,  after  the  session,  but 
Mainhill  was  never  a  less  happy  place  of  retreat  to  him  than 
it  proved  this  summer.  He  could  not  conceal,  perhaps  he  did 
not  try  to  conceal,  the  condition  of  his  mind  ;  and  to  his  fam- 
ily, to  whom  the  truth  of  their  creed  was  no  more  a  matter  of 
doubt  than  the  presence  of  the  sun  in  the  sky,  he  must  have 
seemed  as  if  "  possessed."  He  could  not  read ;  he  wandered 
about  the  moors  like  a  restless  spirit.  His  mother  was  in  ag- 
ony about  him.  He  was  her  darling,  her  pride,  the  apple  of 
her  eye,  and  she  could  not  restrain  her  lamentations  and  re- 
monstrances. His  father,  "mth  supreme  good  judgment,  left 
him  to  himself. 

His  tolerance  for  me,  his  trust  in  me  (Carlyle  says),  was  great.  When  I  declined 
going  forward  into  the  Church,  though  his  heart  was  set  upon  it,  he  respected  my 
scruples,  and  patiently  let  me  have  my  way.  When  I  had  peremptorily  ceased  from 
being  a  schoolmaster,  thoUgh  he  inwardly  disapproved  of  the  step  as  imprudent  and 
saw  me  in  successive  summers  lingering  beside  him  in  sickliness  of  body  and  mind, 
without  outlook  towards  any  good,  he  had  the  forbearance  to  say  at  worst  nothing, 
never  once  to  whisper  discontent  with  me. 

In  November  he  was  back  at  Edinburgh  again,  with  his  pupils 
and  his  new  lectures,  which  he  had  not  yet  deserted,  and  still 
persuaded  himself  that  he  would  persevere  with.  He  did  not 
find  his  friend.  Irving  had  gone  to  Glasgow  to  be  assistant  to 
Dr.  Chalmers. 

The  law  lectures  went  on,  and  Carlyle  wrote  to  his  mother 
about  his  progress  with  them.    "  The  law,"  he  said,  "  I  findTte 
be  a  most  complicated  subject,  yet  I  like  it  pretty  well,  an^^^w 
''^.el  that  I  shall  like  it  better  as  I  proceed.     Its  great  charm       ^ 


^ 


THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE,        ^25 

in  my  eyes  is  that  no  mean  compliances  are  requisite  for  pros- 
pering in  it."  To  Irving  he  had  written  a  fuller,  not  yet  com- 
pletely full,  account  of  himself,  complaining  perhaps  of  his 
obstructions  and  difficulties.  Irving's  advice  is  not  what 
would  have  been  given  by  a  cautious  attorney.  He  admired 
his  friend,  and  only  wished  his  great  capabilities  to  be  known 
as  soon  as  possible. 

Edward  Irving  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

34  Kent  Street,  Glasgow,  December  28, 1819. 
Dear  Carlyle, — I  pray  that  you  may  prosper  in  your  legal  studies,  provided  only  you 
will  give  your  mind  to  take  in  all  the  elements  which  enter  into  the  question  of  the 
obstacles.  But  remember,  it  is  not  want  of  knowledge  alone  that  impedes,  but  want  of 
instruments  for  making  that  ^cnowledge  available.  This  you  know  better  than  I.  Now 
my  view  of  the  matter  is  that  your  knowledge,  likely  very  soon  to  surpass  in  extent 
and  accuracy  that  of  most  of  your  compeers,  is  to  be  made  saleable,  not  by  the  usual 
way  of  adding  friend  to  friend,  which  neither  you  nor  I  are  enough  patient  of,  but  by 
a  way  of  your  own.  Known  you  mu<:t  be  before  you  can  be  employed.  Known  you 
will  not  be  for  a  winning,  attaching,  accommodating  man,  but  for  an  original,  com- 
manding, and  rather  self-willed  man.  Now  establish  this  last  character,  and  you  take  a 
far  higher  grade  than  any  other.  How  are  you  to  establish  it  ?  Just  by  bringing  your- 
self before  the  public  as  you  are.  First  find  vent  for  your  notions.  Get  them  tongue  ; 
upon  every  subject  get  them  tongue,  not  upon  law  alone.  You  cannot  at  present  get 
them  either  utterance  or  audience  by  ordinary  converse.  Your  utterance  is  not  the 
most  favorable.  It  convinces,  but  does  not  persuade ;  and  it  is  only  a  very  few  (I  can 
claim  place  for  myself)  that  it  fascinates.  Your  audience  is  worse.  They  are  gener- 
ally (I  exclude  myself)  unphilosophical,  unthinking  drivelers  who  lie  in  wait  to  catch 
you  in  your  words,  and  who  give  you  little  justice  in  the  recital,  because  you  give  their 
vanity  or  self-esteem  little  justice,  or  even  mercy,  in  the  rencounter.  Therefore,  my 
dear  friend,  some  other  way  is  to  be  sought  for.  Now  pause,  if  you  be  not  convinced 
of  this  conclusion.  If  you  be,  we  shall  proceed.  If  you  be  not,  read  again,  and  you 
will  see  it  just,  and  as  such  admit  it.  Now  what  way  is  to  be  sought  for  ?  I  know  no 
'  other  than  the  press.  You  have  not  the  pulpit  as  I  have,  and  there  perhaps  I  have 
'  the  advantage.  You  have  not  good  and  influential  society.  I  know  nothing  but  the 
press  for  your  purpose.  None  are  so  good  as  these  two,  the  Edinburgh  Review  and 
Blackwood's  Magazine.  Do  not  start  away  and  say.  The  one  I  am  not  fit  for,  the 
other  I  am  not  willing  for.  Both  pleas  I  refuse.  The  Edinburgh  Review  you  are  per- 
fectly fit  for ;  not  yet  upon  law,  but  upon  any  work  of  mathematics,  physics,  general  ^ 
literature,  history,  and  politics,  you  are  as  ripe  as  the  average  of  their  writers.  Black- 
wood's Magazine  presents  bad  company,  I  confess  ;  but  it  also  furnishes  a  good  field 
for  fugitive  writing,  and  good  introductions  to  society  on  one  side  of  the  question. 
This  last  advice,  I  confess,  is  against  my  conscience,  and  I  am  inclined  to  blot  it  out ; 
for  did  I  not  rest  satisfied  that  you  were  to  use  your  pen  for  conscience  I  would  never 
ask  you  to  use  it  for  your  living.  Writers  in  the  encyclopaedias,  except  of  leading  arti- 
cles, do  not  get  out  from  the  crowd  ;  but  writers  in  the  Review  come  out  at  once,  and 
obtain  the  very  opinion  you  want ;  opinion  among  the  intelligent  and  active  men  in 
every  rank,  not  among  the  sluggish  savants  alone. 

It  is  easy  for  me  to  advise  what  many  perhaps  are  as  ready  to  advise.  But  I  know  I 
have  influence,  and  I  am  willing  to  use  |t.  -Therefore,  again  let  me  entreat  you  to  be- 
gin a  new  year  by  an  effort  continuous,  not  for  getting  knowledge,  but  for  communi- 


526 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 


eating  it,  that  you  may  gain  favor,  and  money,  and  opinion.  Do  not  disembark  all 
your  capital  of  thought,  and  time,  and  exertion  into  thiscontem,  but  disembark  a  por- 
tion equal  to  its  urgency,  and  make  the  experiment  upon  a  proper  scale.  If  it  succeed, 
the  spirit  of  adventure  will  follow,  and  you  will  be  ready  to  embark  more  ;  if  it  fail,  no 
great  venture  was  made  ;  no  great  venture  is  lost ;  the  time  is  not  yet  come.  But  you 
will  have  got  a  more  precise  view  by  the  failure,  if  the  obstacles  to  be  surmounted,  and 
time  and  energy  will  give  you  what  you  lacked.  Therefore  I  advise  you  as  a  very 
sincere  friend  that  forthwith  you  choose  a  topic,  not  that  you  are  best  informed  on,  but 
that  you  are  most  likely  to  find  admittance  for,  and  set  apart  some  portion  of  each  day 
or  week  to  this  object  and  this  alone,  leaving  the  rest  free  for  objects  professional  and 
pleasant.  This  is  nothing  more  than  yrhat  I  urged  at  our  last  meeting  but  I  have 
nothing  to  write  I  deem  so  important.  Therefore  do  take  it  to  thought.  Depend  upon 
it,  you  will  be  delivered  by  such  present  adventure  from  those  harpies  of  your  peace 
you  are  too  much  tormented  with.  You  will  get  a  class  with  whom  society  will  be  as 
pleasant  as  we  have  found  it  together,  and*  you  will  open  up  ultimate  prospects  which 
I  trust  no  man  shall  be  able  to  close. 

I  think  our  town  is  safe  for  every  leal-hearted  man  to  his  Maker  and  to  his  fellow- 
men  to  traverse  without  fear  of  scaith.  Such  traversing  is  the  wine  and  milk  of  my 
present  existence.  I  do  not  warrant  against  a  Radical  rising,  though  I  think  it  vastly 
improbable.  But  continue  these  lines  a  year  or  two,  and  unless  you  unmake  our  pres- 
ent generation  and  unman  them  of  human  feeling  and  of  Scottish  intelligence,  you 
will  have  commotion.  It  is  impossible  for  them  to  die  of  starvation,  and  they  are 
makiifg  no  provision  to  have  them  relieved.  And  what  on  earth  is  for  them  ?  God 
and  my  Saviour  enable  me  to  lift  their  hearts  above  a  world  that  has  deserted  them, 
though  they  live  in  its  plenty  and  labor  in  its  toiling  service,  and  fix  them  upon  a  world 
which,  my  dear  Carlyle,  I  wish  you  and  I  had  the  inheritance  in  ;  which  we  may  have 
if  we  will.  But  I  am  not  going  to  preach,  else  I  would  plunge  into  another  subject 
which  I  rate  above  all  subjects.  Yet  this  ^ould  not  be  excluded  from  our  commun- 
ion either. 

I  am  getting  on  quietly  enough,  and,  if  I  be  defended  from  the  errors  of  my  heart, 
may  do  pretty  well.  The  Doctor  (Chalmers)  is  full  of  acknowledgments,  and  I  ought 
to  be  full — to  a  higher  source. 

Yours  affectionately, 

Edward  Irving. 

Carlyle  was  less  eager  to  give  his  thoughts  "  tongue  "  than 
Irving  supposed.  He  had  not  yet,  as  he  expressed  it,  "  taken 
the  devil  by  the  horns."  He  did  not  mean  to  trouble  the 
world  with  his  doubts,  and  as  yet  he  had  not  much  else  to 
trouble  it  with.  But  he  was  more  and  more  restless.  Reti- 
cence about  his  personal  sufferings  was  at  no  time  one  of  his 
virtues.  Dyspepsia  had  him  by  the  throat.  Even  the  minor 
ailments  to  which  our  flesh  is  heir,  and  which  most  of  us  bear 
in  silence,  the  eloquence  of  his  imagination  flung  into  forms 
like  the  temptations  of  a  saint.  His  mother  had  early  de- 
scribed him  as  "gay  ill  to  live  wi'/'  and  while  in  great  things 
he  was  the  most  considerate  and  generous  of  men,  in  trifles 
he  was  intolerably  irritable.    Dyspepsia  accounts  for  most  o\ 


1- 


THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE.  $2/ 

it.  He  did  not  knpw  what  was  the  matter  with  hiiti,  and  wh^n 
the  fit  was  severe  he  drew  pictures  of  his  condition  which 
frightened  every  one  belonging  to  him.  He  had  sent  his  fam- 
ily in  the  middle  of  the  winter  a  report  of  himself  which 
made  them  think  that  he  was  seriously  ill.  His  brother  John, 
who  had  now  succeeded  him  as  a  teacher  in  Annan  school, 
was  sent  for  in  haste  to  Mainhill  to  a  consultation,  and  the 
result  was  a  letter  which  shows  the  touching  affection  with 
which  the  Carlyles  clung  to  one  another. 

'  J,  A,  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

Mainhill,  February,  1820. 
I  have  just  arrived  from  Annan,  and  we  are  all  so  uneasy  on  your  account  that  at  the 
request  of  my  father  in  particular,  and  of  all  the  rest,  I  am  determined  to  write  to  call 
on  you  for  a  speedy  answer.  Your  father  and  mother,  and  all  of  us,  are  extremely 
anxious  that  you  should  come  home  directly  if  possible,  if  you  think  you  can  come 
without  danger.  And  we  trust  that,  notwithstanding  the  bitterness  of  last  summer, 
you  will  still  find  it  emphatically  a  home.  My  mother  bids  me  call  upon  you  to  do  so 
by  every  tie  of  affection,  and  by  all  that  is  sacred.  She  esteems  seeing  you  again  and 
administering  comfort  to  you  as  her  highest  felicity.  Your  father,  also,  is  extremely 
anxious  to  see  you  again  at  home.  The  room  is  much  more  comfortable  than  it  was 
last  season.  The  roads  are  repaired,  and  all  things  more  convenient ;  and  we  all  trust 
that  you  will  yet  recover,  after  you  shall  have  inhaled  your  native  breezes  and  escaped 
once  more  from  the  unwholesome  city  of  Edinburgh,  and  its  selfish  and  unfeeling 
inhabitants.  In  the  name  of  all,  then,  I  call  upon  you  not  to  neglect  or  refuse  our 
earnest  wishes  ;  to  come  home  and  experience  the  comforts  of  parental  and  brotherly 
affection,  which,  though  rude  and  without  polish,  is  yet  sincere  and  honest. . 

The  father  adds  a  postscript : — 

My  dear  Tom, — I  have  been  very  uneasy  about  you  ever  since  wc  received  your 
moving  letter,  and  I  thought  to  have  written  to  you  myself  this  day  and  told  you  all 
my  thoughts  about  your  health,  which  is  the  foundation  and  copestone  of  all  our 
earthly  comfort.  But,  being  particularly  engaged  this  day,  I  caused  John  to  write. 
Come  home  as  soon  as  possible,  and  for  ever  oblige, 

Dear  sir,  your  loving  father. 

Jambs  Carlyle. 

The  fright  had  been  unnecessary.  Dyspepsia,  while  it  tor- 
tures body  and  mind,  does  little  serious  injury.  The  attack 
had  passed  off.  A  letter  from  Carlyle  was  already  on  the  way, 
in  which  the  illness  was  scarcely  noticed ;  it  contained  little 
but  directions  for  his  brother's  studies,  and  an  offer  of  ten 
pounds  out  of  his  scantily  filled  purse  to  assist  "  Sandy"  on 
the  farm.  With  his  family  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  talk 
freely,  and  through  his  gloomy  time  he  had  but  one  friend 


528 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 


though  he  was  of.  priceless  value.  To  Irving  he  had  written 
out  his  discontent.  He  was  now  disgusted  with  law,  and  meant 
to  abandon  it.  Irving,  pressed  as  he  was  with  work,  could 
always  afford  Carlyle  the  best  of  his  time  and  judgment. 

Edward  Irving  to  Thomas  Carlyle, 

Glasgow,  March  14,  xSao. 

Since  I  received  your  last  epistle,  which  reminded  me  of  some  of  those  gloomy 
scenes  of  nature  I  have  often  had  the  greatest  pleasure  in  contemplating,  I  have  been 
wrought  almost  to  death,  having  had  three  sermons  to  write,  and  one  of  them  a  charity 
sermon  ;  but  I  shall  make  many  sacrifices  before  I  shall  resign  the  entertainment  and 
benefit  I  derive  from  our  correspondence. 

Your  mind  is  of  too  penetrating  a  cast  to  rest  satisfied  with  the  frail  disguise  which 
the  happiness  of  ordinary  life  has  thrown  on  to  hide  its  nakedness,  and  I  do  never 
augur  that  your  nature  is  to  be  satisfied  with  its  sympathies.  Indeed,  I  am  convinced 
that  were  you  translated  into  the  most  elegant  and  informed  circle  of  this  city,  you 
would  find  it  please  only  by  its  no.velty,  and  perhaps  refresh  by  its  variety  ;  but  you 
would  be  constrained'  to  seek  the  solid  employment  and  the  lasting  gratification  of 
your  mind  elsewhere.  The  truth  is,  life  is  a  thing  formed  for  the  average  of  men,  and 
it  is  only  in  those  parts  of  our  nature  which  are  of  average  possession  that  it  can 
gratify.  The  higher  parts  of  our  nature  find  their  entertainment  in  sympathizing 
with  the  highest  efforts  of  our  species,  which  are,  and  will  continue,  confined  to  the 
closet  of  the  sage,  and  can  never  find  their  station  in  the  drawin^room  of  the  talking 
world.  Indeed,  I  will  go  higher  and  say  that  the  highest  parts  of  our  nature  can  never 
have  their  proper  food  till  they  turn  to  contemplate  the  excellencies  of  our  Creator, 
and  not  only  to  contemplate  but  to  imitate  them.  Therefore  it  is,  my  dear  Carlyle, 
that  I  exhort  you  to  call  in  the  finer  parts  of  your  mind,  and  to  try  to  present  the 
society  about  you  with  those  more  ordinary  displays  which  they  can  enjoy.  The  indif- 
ference with  which  they  receive  them,*  and  the  ignorance  with  which  they  treat  them, 
operate  on  the  mind  like  gall  and  wormwood.  I  would  entreat  you  to  be  comforted  in 
the  possession  of  your  treasures,  and  to  study  more  the  times  and  persons  to  which 
you  bring  them  forth.  When  I  say  your  treasures,  I  mean  not  your  information  so 
much,  which  they  will  bear  the  display  of  for  the  reward  and  value  of  it,  but  of  your 
feelings  and  affections,  which,  being  of  finer  tone  than  theirs,  and  consequently  seek- 
ing a  keener  expression,  they  are  apt  to  mistake  for  a  rebuke  of  their  own  tameness, 
or  for  intolerance  of  ordinary  things,  and  too  many  of  them,  I  fear,  for  asperity  of 
mind. 

There  is  just  another  panacea  for  your  griefs  ^which  are  not  imaginar>%  but  for 
which  I  see  a  real  ground  in  the  too  penetrating  and,  at  times  perhaps,  too  severe  turn 
of  your  mind) ;  but  though  I  judge  it  better  and  more  worthy  than  Reserve,  it  is  per- 
haps more  difficult  of  practice.  I  mean  the  habit  of  using  our  superiority  for  the  in- 
formation and  improvement  of  others.  This  I  reckon  both  the  most  dignified  and  the 
most  kindly  course  that  one  can  take,  founded  upon  the  great  principles  of  human 
improvement,  and  founded  upon  what  I  am  wont,  or  at  least  would  wish,  to  make  my 
pattern,  the  example  of  the  Saviour  of  men,  who  endured,  in  His  errand  of  salvation, 
the  contradiction  of  men.  But  I  confess,  on  the  other  hand,  one  meets  with  so  few 
that  are  apt  disciples,  or  willing  to  allow  superiority,  that  will  be  constantly  fighting 
with  you  upon  the  threshold,  that  it  is  very  heartless,  and  forces  one  to  reserve.  And 
besides,  one  is  so  apt  to  fancy  a  superiority  where  there  is  none,  that  it  is  likely  to 
produce  overmuch  self-complacency.  But  I  see  I  am  beginning  to  prose,  and  there- 
■  ~~  ■ r— 

*  /.  e,  the  talks  to  which  you  usually  treat  your  friends. 


J 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE.        $^9 

fore  shall  change  the  subject — with  only  one  remstrk,  that  your  tone  of  mind  reminds 
me  more  than  anything  of  my  own  when  under  the  sense  of  great  religious  imperfec- 
tion, and  anxiously  pursuing  after  higher  Christian''attainments.  .  .  . 

I  have  read  your  letter  again,  and,  at  the  risk  of  further  prosing,  I  shall  have  an- 
other hit  at  its  contents.  You  talk  of  renouncing  the  law,  and  you  speak  mysteriously 
of  hope  springing  up  from  another  quarter.  I  pray  that  it  may  soon  be  turned  into 
enjoyment.  But  I  would  not  have  you  renounce  the  law  unless  you  coolly  think  that 
this  new  view  contains  those  fields  of  happiness,  from  the  want  of  which  the  prospect 
of  law  has  become  so  dreary.  Law  has  within  it  scope  ample  enough  for  any  mind. 
The  reformation  which  it  needs,  and  which  with  so  much  humor  and  feeling  you  de- 
scribe,* is  the  very  evidence  of  what  I  say.  Did  Adam  Smith  find  the  commercial 
system  less  encumbered  ?  (I  know  he  did  not  find  it  more)  and  see  what  order  the 
mind  of  one  man  has  made  there.  Such  a  reformation  must  be  wrought  in  law,  and 
the  spirit  of  the  age  is  manifestly  bending  that  way.  I  know  none  who,  from  his 
capacity  of  remembering  and  digesting  facts,  and  of  arranging  them  into  general  re- 
sults, is  so  well  fitted  as  yourself. 

With  regard  to  my  own  affairs,  I  am  becoming  too  much  of  a  man  of  business,  and 
too  little  a  man  of  contemplation.  I  meet  with  few  minds  to  excite  me,  many  to  drain 
me  off,  and,  by  the  habit  of  discharging  and  receiving  nothing  in  return,  I  am  run  off 
to  the  very  lees,  as  you  may  easily  discern.  I  have  a  German  master  and  a  class  in 
college.  I  have  seen  neither  for  a  week,  such  is  the  state  of  my  engagements — engage- 
ments with  I  know  not  what ;  with  preaching  in  St.  John's  once  a  week,  and  employ- 
ing the  rest  of  the  week  in  visiting  objects  in  which  I  can  learn  nothing,  unless  I  am 
collecting  for  a  new  series  of  Tales  of  my  Landlord,  which  should  range  among  Radi- 
cals and  smugglers. 

Dr.  Chalmers,  though  a  most  entire  original  by  himself,  is  surrounded  with  a  very 
prosaical  sort  of  persons,  who  please  me  something  by  their  zeal  to  carry  into  effect  his 
philosophical  schemes,  and  vex  me  much  by  their  idolatry  of  him.  My  comfort*  are 
in  hearing  the  distresses  of  the  people,  and  doing  my  mite  to  alleviate  them.  They 
are  not  in  the  higher  walks  (I  mean  as  to  wealth)  in  which  I  am  permitted  to  move, 
nor  yet  in  the  greater  publicity  and  notoriety  I  enjoy.  Every  minister  in  Glasgow  is 
an  oracle  to  a  certain  class  of  devotees.  I  would  not  give  one  day  in  solitude  or  in 
meditation  with  a  friend  as  I  have  enjoyed  it  often  along  the  sands  of  Kirkcaldy  for 
ages  in  this  way.  .  ,  . 

Yours,  most  truly, 

Edward  Irving. 

It  does  not  appear  what  the  "  other  quarter  "  may  have 

been  on  which  the  prospect  was  brightening.    Carlyle  was 

not  more  explicit  to  his  mother,  to  whom  he  wrote  at  this 

time  a  letter  unusually  gentle  and  melancholy. 

Thomas  Carlyle  to  Mrs,  Carlyle, 

Edinburgh,  March  29,  1820. 
To  you,  my  dear  mother,  I  can  never  be  sufficiently  grateful,  not  only  for  the  com- 
mon kindness  of  a  mother,  but  for  the  unceasing  watchfulness  with  which  you  strode 
to  instil  virtuous  principles  into  my  young  mind ;  and  though  we  are  separated  at 
present,  and  may  be  still  more  widely  separated,  I  hope  the  lessons  which  you  taught 
will  never  be  effaced  from  my  memory.  I  cannot  say  how  I  have  fallen  into  this  train 
of  thought,  but  the  days  of  childhood  arise  with  so  many  pleasing  recollections,  and 

*  Carlylc's  letters  to  Irving  are  all  unfortunately  lost. 


S 30  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA GAZINE, 

shine  so  brightly  across  the  tempests  and  inquietudes  of  succeeding  times,  that  I  felt 
unable  to  resist  the  impulse. 

You  already  know  that  I  am  pretty  well  as  to  health,  and  also  that  I  design  to  visit 
you  again  before  many  months  have  elapsed.  1  cannot  say  that  ray  prospects  have 
got  much  brighter  since  I  left  you  :  the  aspect  of  the  future  is  still  as  unsettled  as  ever 
it  was  ;  but  some  degree  of  patience  is  behind,  and  hope,  the  charmer,  that  "  springs 
eternal  in  the  human  breast,"  is  yet  herp  likewise.  I  am  not  of  a  humor  to  care  very- 
much  for  good  or  evil  fortune,  so  far  as  concerns  himself.  The  thought  that  my 
somewhat  uncertain  condition  gives  you  uneasiness  chiefly  grieves  nie.  Yet  I  would 
not  have  you  despair  of  your  ribe  oi*z.  boy.  He  loill  do  something  yet.  He  is  a  shy, 
stingy  soul,  and  very  likely  has  a  higher  notion  of  bis  parts  than  others  hav,e.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  he  is  not  incapable  of  diligence.  He  is  harmless,  and  possesses  the 
virtue  of  his  country— thrift ;  96  that,  after  all,  things  will  yet  be  right  in  the  cnd- 
My  love  to  all  the  little  ones. 

Your  affectionate  son, 

T.  Carlyla. 

The  University  term  ends  early  in  Scotland.  The  expenses 
of  the  six  months  which  the  students  spend  at  college  are 
paid  for  in  many  instances  by  the  bodily  labors  of  the  other 
six.  The  end  of  April  sees  them  all  dispersed,  the  class-room 
closed,  the  pupils  no  longer  obtainable ;  and  the  law  studies 
being  finally  abandoned,  Carlyle  had  nothing  more  to  do  at 
Edinburgh,  and  migrated  with  the  rest.  He  was  going  home  ; 
he  offered  himself  for  a  yisit  to  Irving  at  Glasgow  on  the  way> 
and  the  proposal  was  warmly  accepted.  The  Irving  cor- 
respondence was  not  long  continued  ;  and  I  make  the  most 
of  the  letters  of  so  remarkable  man  which  were  written  while 
he  was  still  himself,  before  his  intellect  was  clouded. 

Edward  Irving  to  T.  Carlyle, 

34  Kent  Street,  Glasgow,  April  15, 1820. 

My  Dear  Carlyle,-~Right  happy  shall  I  be  to  have  your  company  and  conversation  for 
ever  so  short  a  time,  and  the  longer  the  better  ;  and  if  you  could  contrive  to  make  youn 
visit  so  that  the  beginning  of  the  week  should  be  the  time  of  your  departure,  I  could 
bear  you  company  on  your,  road  a  day's  journey.  I  have  just  finished  my  sermon — 
Saturday  at  six  o'clock — at  which  I  have  been  sitting  without  interruption  since  ten  ; 
but  I  resolved  that  you  should  have  my  letter  to-morrow,  that  nothing  might  prevent 
your  promised  visit,  to  which  I  hold  you  now  altogether  bound. 

It  is  very  dangerous  to  speak  one's  mind  here  about  the  state  of  the  country.  I 
reckon,  however,  the  Radicals  liave  in  a  manner  expatriated  themselves  from  the  po- 
litical co-operation  of  the  better  classes  ;  and,  at  tfie  same  time,  I  believe  there  was 
sympathy  enough  in  the  middle  and  well-informed  people  to  have  caused  umelioratiou 
of  our  political  evils,  had  they  taken  time  and  legal  measures.  I  am  very  sorry -for 
the  poor;  they  are  lasing  their  religion,  their  domestic  comfort,  their  pride  of  inde- 
pendence, their  everything  ;  if  timeous  remedies  come  not  soon,  they  will  sink,  I  fear, 

•0  the  degradation  of  the  Irish  peasantry  ;  and  if  that  class  goes  down,  then  along 


•..;.i^ 


THE  EARL  V  LIFE  OF  THOMA  S  CARL  YLE,  5  3 1 

with  it  sinks  the  morality  of  every  other  class.  We  are  at  a  complete  stand  here ;  a  sort 
of  military  glow  has  taken  all  ranks.  They  can  see  the  houses  of  the  poor  ransacked 
for  artns  without  uttering  an  interjection  of  grief  on  the  fallen  greatness  of  those  who 
brought  in  our  Reformation  and  our  civil  liberty,  and  they  will  hardly  suffer  a  sym- 
pathizing word  from  anyone.  Dr.  Chalmers  takes  a  safe  course  in  all  these  difficulties. 
The  truth  is,  he  does  not  side  with  any  party.  He  has  a  few  political  nostrums  so  pe- 
culiar that  they  serve  to  detach  his  ideal  mind  both  from  Whigs  and  Tories  and  Radi- 
cals— that  Britain  would  have  been  as  flourishing  and  full  of  capital  though  there  had 
been  round  the  island  a  brazen  wall  a  thousand  cubits  high ;  that  the  national  debt 
does  us  neither  good  nor  ill,  amounting  to  nothing  more  or  less  than  a  mortgage  upon 
property,  etc.  The  Whigs  dare  not  speak.  The  philanthropists  are  so  much  taken 
up,  each  with  his  own  locality,  as  to  take  little  charge  of  the  general  concern  ;  and  so 
the  Tories  have  room  to  rage  and  talk  big  about  armaments  and  pikes  and  battles. 
-  They  had  London  well  fortified  yesterday  by  the  Radicals,  and  so  forth. 

Now  it  will  be  like  the  unimprisoning  of  a  bird  to  come  and  let  me  have  free  talk.  Not 
that  I  have  anything  to  say  in  favor  of  F^adicalism,  for  it  is  the  very  destitution  of 
philosophy  and  religion  and  political  economy  ;  but  that  we  may  lose  ourselves  so  de- 
lightfully in  reveries  upon  the  emendation  of  the  State,  to  which,  in  fact,  you  and  I 
can  bring  as  little  help  as  we  could  have  done  against  the  late  inundation  of  the  Val- 
lois. 

I  like  the  tone  of  your  last  letter:  for,  remember,  I  read  your  very  tones  and  ges- 
tures, at  this  distance  of  place,  through  your  letter,  though  it  be  not  the  most  diapha- 
nous of  bodies.  I  have  no  more  fear  of  yo\ir  final  success  than  Noah  had  of  the  Deluge 
ceasing ;  and  theugh  the  first  dove  returned,  as  you  say  you  are  to  return  to  your 
father's  shelter,  without  even  a  leaf,  yet  the  next  time,  believe  me,  you  shall  return 
with  a  leaf  ;  and  yet  another  time,  and  you  shall  take  a  flight  who  knows  where  ?  *  But 
of  this  and  otheir  things  I  delay  further  parley. 

Yours  affectionately, 

Edward  Irving. 

Carlyle  went  to  Glasgow,  spent  several  days  there,  noting,  ac- 
cording to  his  habit,  the  outward  signs  of  men  and  things.  He 
saw  the  Glasgow  merchants  in  the  Tontine,  he  observed  them, 
fine,  clean,  opulent,  with  their  shining  bald  crowns  and  serene 
white  heads,  sauntering  about  or  reading  their  newspapers. 
He  criticised  the  dresses  of  the  young  ladies,  for  whom  he 
had  always  an  eye,  remarking  that  with  all  .their  charms  they 
had- less  taste  in  their  adornments  than  were  to  be  seen  in 
Edinburgh  drawing-rooms.  He  saw  Chalmers,  too,  and  heard 
him  preach.  "Never  preacher  went  so  into  one's  heart." 
Some  private  talk,  too,  there  was  with  Chalmers, "  the  doctor  " 
explaining  to  him  "  a  new  scheme  for  proving  the  truth  of 
Christianity,"  "  all  written  in  us  already  m  a  sy7npathetic  ink  ; 
Bible  awakens  it,  and  you  can  read." 

But  the  chief  interest  in  the  Glasgow  visit  lies  less  in  itself 
than  in  what  followed  it — a  conversation  between  two  young, 


532  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MAGAZINE, 

then  unknown,  men,  walking  alone  together  over  a  Scotch 
moor,  the  most  trifling  of  actual  incidents,  a  mere  feather 
floating  before  the  wind,  yet,  like  the  feather,  marking  the 
direction  of  the  invisible  tendency  of  human  thought.  Carlyle 
was  to  walk  home  to  Ecclefechan.  Irving  had  agreed  to  ac- 
company him  fifteen  miles  of  his  road,  and  then  leave  him  and 
return.  They  started  early,  and  breakfasted  on  the  way  at  the 
manse  of  a  Mr.  French.    Carlyle  himself  tells  the  rest. 

Drumclox  Moss  is  the  next  object  that  survives,  and  Irving  and  I  sitting  by  ourselves 
under  the  silent  bright  skies  among  the  **  peat  hags  '*  of  Drumclog  with  a  world  all 
silent  round  us.  These  peat  hags  are  still  pictured  in  me ;  .brown  bog  all  pitted  and 
broken  with  heathy  remnants  and  bare  abrupt  wide  holes,  four  oriive  feet  deep^  mostly 
dry  at  present ;  a  flat  wilderness  of  broken  bog,  of  quagmire  not  to  be  trusted  (probably 
wetter  in  old  days,  and  wet  still  in  rainy  seasons).  Clearly  a  good  place  for  Camero- 
nian  preaching,  and  dangerously  difficult  for  Claverse  and  horse  soldiery  if  the  suffering 
-  remnant  had  a  few  old  muskets  among  them  !  Scott's  novels  had  given  the  Cleavers 
skirmish  here,  which  all  Scotland  knew  of  already,  a  double  interest  in  those  days.  I 
know  not  that  we  talked  much  of  this  ;  but  we  did  of  many  things,  perhaps  more  con- 
fidentially than  ever  before  ;  a  colloquy  the  sum  of  which  is  still  mournfully  beautiful 
to  me  though  the  derails  are  gone.  I  remember  us  sitting  on  the  brow  of  a  peat  hag, 
the  sun  shining,  our  own  voices  the  one  sound  Far,  far  away  to  the  westward  over 
our  brown  horizon,  towered  up,  white  and  visible  at  the  many  miles  of  distance,  a  high 
irregular  pyramid.  ^*  Ailsa  Craig '  we  at  once  guessed,  and  thought  of  the  seas  and 
oceans  over  yonder.  But  we  did  not  long  dwell  on  that — we  seem  to  have  seen  no  hu- 
man creature,  after  French,  to  have  had  no  bother  and  no  need  of  human  assistance  or 
society,  not  even  of  reflection,  French's  breakfast  perfectly  sufficing  us.  The  talk  had 
grown  even  friendlier,  more  interesting.  Ai  length  the  declining  sun  said  plainly,  you 
must  part.  We  sauntered  slowly  into  the  Glasgow  Muirkirk  highway.  Masons  were 
building  a  wayside  cottage  near  by,  or  were  packing  up  on  ceasing  for  the  day.  We 
lent  o)ir  backs  to  a  dry  stone  fence,  and  looking  into  the  western  radiance  continued 
in  talk  yet  awhile,  loth  both  of  us  to  go.  It  was  just  here  as  the  sun  was  sinking,  Irv- 
ing actually  drew  from  me,  by  degrees,  in  the  softest  manner,  the  confession  that  I  did 
not  think  as  he  of  the  Christian  religion,  and  that  it  was  vain  for  me  to  expect  I  ever 
could  or  should.  This,  if  this  was  so,  he  had  pre-engaged  to  take  well  from  me  like 
an  elder  brother,  if  I  woUld  be  frank  with  him,  and  right  loyally  he  did  so,  and  to  the 
end  of  his  life  we  needed  no  concealments  on  that  head,  which  was  really  a  step  gained. 

The  sun  was  about  setting  when  we  turned  away,  each  on  his  own  path.  Irving 
would  have  had  a  good  space  further  to  go  than  I,  perhaps  fifteen  or  seventeen  miles, 
and  would  not  be  in  Kent  Street  till  towards  midnight.  But  he  feared  no  amount  of 
walking,  enjoyed  it  rather,  as  did  I  in  those  young  years.  I  felt  sad,  but  affectionate 
and  good  in  my  clean,  utterly  quiet  little  inn  at  Muirkirk,  which  and  my  feelings  in  it 
I  still  well  remember.  An  innocent  little  Glasgow  youth  (young  bagman  on  his  first 
journey,  I  supposed)  had  talked  awhile  with  me  in  the  otherwise  solitary  little  sitting 
room.  At  parting  he  shook  hands,  and  with  something  of  sorrow  in  his  tone  said, 
^*  Good  night.    I  shall  not  see^<7»  again.''    I  was  off  next'moi-ning  at  four  o'clock. 

'Nothing  further  has  to  be  recorded  of  Carlyle 's  history  for 
some  months.  He  remained  quietly  through  the  spring  and 
summer  at  Main  hill,  occupied  chiefly  in  reading.     He  was 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE.        533 

ginning  his  acquaintance  with  Grerman  literature,  his  friend 
Mr.  Swan,  of  Kirkcaldy,  who  had  correspondents  at  Hamburg, 
providing  him  with  books.  .  He  was  still  writing  small  articles, 
too,  for  Brewster's  Encyclopaedia,  unsatisfactory  work,  though 
better  than  none. 

I  was  timorously  aiming  towards  literature  (he  says — perhaps  in  consequence  of 
Irving's  urgency).  I  thought  in  audacious  moments  I  might  perhaps  earn  some  w^es 
that  way  by  honest  labor,  somehow  to  help  my  finances ;  but  in  that  too  I  was  pain- 
fully skeptical  (talent  and  opportunity  alike  doubtful,  alike  incredible  to  me,  poor 
downtrodden  soul),  and  in  fact  there  came  little  enough  of  produce  and  finance  to  me 
from  that  source,  and  for  the  first  years  absolutely  none,  in  spite  of  my  diligent  and 
desperate  efforts,  which  are  sad  to  me  to  think  of  even  now.  Acti  labores.  Yes,  but 
of  such  a  futile,  dismal,  lonely,  dim,  and  chaotic  kind,  in  a  scene  all  ghastly  chaos  to 
me.  Sad,  dim,  and  ugly  »s  the  shores  of  Styx  and  Phlegethon,  as  a  nightmare  dream 
became  real.    No  more  of  that ;  it  did  not  conquer  me,  or  quite  kill  me,  thank  God. 

August  brought  Irving  to  Annan  for  his  summer  holidays, 
which  opened  possibilities  of  renewed  companionship.  Main- 
hill  was  but  seven  miles  off,  and  the  friends  met  and  wandered 
together  in  the  Mount  Annan  woods,  Irving  steadily  cheering 
Carlyle  with  confident  promises  of  ultimate  success.  In 
September  came  an  offer  of  a  tutorship  in  a  "  statesman's  "  * 
family,  which  Irving  urged  him  to  accept. 

You  live  too  much  in  an  ideal  world  (Irving  said),  and  you  are  likely  to  be  punished 
for  it  by  an  unfitness  for  practical  life.  It  is  not  your  fault  but  the  misfortune  of  your 
circumstances,  as  it  has  been  in  a  less  degree  of  my  own.  This  situation  will  be 
more  a  remedy  for  that  than  if  you  were  to  go  back  to  Edinburgh.  Try  your  hand 
with  the  respectable  illiterate  men  of  middle  life,  as  I  am  doing  at  present,  and  perhaps 
in  their  honesty  and  hearty  kindness  you  may  be  taught  to  forget,  and  perhaps  to 
undervalue  the  splendors,  and  envies,  and  competitions  of  men  of  literature.  I  think 
you  have  within  you  the  ability  to  rear  the  pillars  of  your  own  immortality,  and,  what 
is  more,  of  your  own  happiness,  from  the  basis  of  any  level  in  life,  and  I  would  always 
have  any  man  destined  to  influence  the  interests  of  men,  to  have  read  these  interests 
as  they  are  disclosed  in  the  mass  of  men,  and  not  in  the  few  who  are  lifted  upon  the 
eminence  of  life,  and  when  there  too  often  forget  the  man  to  ape  the  ruler  or  the  mon- 
arch. All  that  is  valuable  of  the  literarj'  caste  you  have  in  their  writings.  Their 
conversations,  I  am  told,  are  full  of  jealousy  and  reserve,  or  perhaps,  to  cover  that 
reserve,  of  trifling. 

Irving's  judgment  was  perhaps  at  fault  in  his  advice.  Car- 
lyle, proud,  irritable,  and  impatient  as  he  was,  could  not  have 
remained  a  week  in  such  a  household.  His  ambition  (down- 
trodden as  he  might  call  himself)  was  greater  than  he  knew. 

*  '*  Statesman,*'  or  small  freeholder  farming  his  own  land,  common  still  in  Cumber- 
land, then  spread  over  the  northern  counties. 


534       .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

He  may  have  felt  like  Halbert  Glendinning  when  the  hope 
was  held  out  to  him  of  becoming  the  Abbot's  head  keeper — 
"  a  body  servant,  and  to  a  lazy  priest ! "  At  any  rate  the  pro- 
posal came  to  nothing,  and  with  the  winter  he  was  back  once 
more  at  his  lodgings  in  Edinburgh,  determined  to  fight  his 
way  somehow,  though  in  what  direction  he  could  not  yet  de- 
cide or  see.  / 
T,  Carlyle  to  Alexander  Carfyle.                            I 

Edinburgh,  December  5, 1820. 

I  sit  down  with  the  greatest  pleasure  to  answer  your  most  acceptable  letter.  The 
warm  affection,  the  generous  sympathy  displayed  in  it  go  near  the  heart,  and  shed  over 
me  a  meek  and  kindly  dew  of  brotherly  love  more  refreshing  than  any  but  a  wander- 
ing forlorn  mortal  can  well  imagine.  Some  of  your  expressions  affect  me  almost  to 
weakness,  I  might  say  with  pain,  if  I  did  not  hope  the  course  of  events  will  change 
ou'r  feelings  from  anxiety  to  congratulation,  from  soothing  adversity  to  adorning  pros- 
perity, I  marked  your  disconsolate  look.  It  has  often  since  been  painted  in  the 
mind's  eye.  But  believe  me,  my  boy,  these  days  will  pass  over.  We  shall  all  get  to 
rights  in  good  time,  and  long  after,  cheer  many  a  winter  evening  by  recalling  such 
pensive  but  yet  amiable  and  manly  thoughts  to  our  minds.  And  in  the  meanwhile 
let  me  utterly  sweep  away  the  vain  fear  of  our  forgetting  one  another.  There  is  less 
danger  of  this  than  of  anything.  We  Carlyles  are  a  clannish  people  because  we  have 
all  something  original  in  our  formation,  and  find  therefore  less  than  common  sympathy 
with  others  ;  so  that  we  are  constrained,  a<$  it  were,  to  draw  to  one  another,  and  to 
seek  that  friendship  in  our  own  blood  which  we  do  not  find  so  readily  elsewhere. 
Jack  and  I  and  you  will  respect  one  another  to  the  end  of  our  lives,  because  I  predict 
that  our  conduct  will  be  worthy  of  respect,  and  we  will  love  one  another  because  the 
feelings  of  our  young  days — feelings  impressed  most  deeply  on  the  young  heart — are 
all  intertwined  and  united  by  the  tenderest  yet  strongest  ties  of  our  nature.  But 
independently  of  this  your  fear  is  vain.  Continue  to  cultivate  your  abilities,  and  to 
behave  steadily  and  quietly  as  you  have  done,  and  neither  of  the  two  literati  ♦  are 
likely  to  find  many  persons  more  qualified  to  appreciate  their  feelings  than  the  farmer, 
their  brother.  Greek  words  and  Latin  are  fine  things,  but  they  cannot  hide  the 
emptiness  and  lowness  of  many  who  employ  them. 

Brewster  has  printed  my  article.  He  is  a  pushing  man  and  speaks  encouragingly  to 
me.  Tait,  the  bookseller,  is  loud  in  his  kind  anticipations  of  the  grand  things  that  are 
in  store  for  me.  But  in  fact  I  do  not  lend  much  ear  to  those  gentjemen.  I  feel  quite 
sick  of  this  drivelling  state  of  painful  idleness.  I  am  going  to  be  patient  no  longer, 
but  quitting  study  or  leaving  it  in  a  secondary  place  I  feel  determined^  as  it  were,  to 
•  find  something  stationary,  some  local  habitation  and  some  name  for  myself,  ere  it 
be  long.  I  shall  turn  and  try  all  things,  be  diligent,  be  assiduous  in  season  and  out  of 
season  to  effect  this  prudent  purpose  ;  and  if  health  stay  with  me  I  still  trust  I  shall 
succeed.  At  worst  it  is  but  narrowing  my  views  to  suit  my  means.  I  shall  enter  the 
writing  life,  the  mercantile,  the  lecturing,  any  life  in  short  but  that  of  country  school- 
master, §nd  even  that  sad  refuge  from  the  storms  of  fate,  rather  than  stand  here  in 
frigid  impotence,  the  powers  of  my  mind  all  festering  and  corroding  each  other  in  the 
miserable  strife  of  inward  will  against  outward  necessity. 

I  lay  out  my  heart  before  you,  my  boy,  because  it  is  solacing  for  roe  to  do  so ;  but  I 
would  not  have  you  think  me  depressed.    Bad  health  does  indeed  depress  and  under- 

♦  His  brother  John  and  himself. 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE.         $35 

mine  one  more  than  all  other  calamities  put  together,  hut  with  care,  which  I  have  the 
best  of  all  reasons  for  taking,  I  know  this  will  in  time  get  out  of  danger.  Steady  then, 
steady  !  as  the  drill-sergeants  say.  Let  us  be  steady  unto  the  end.  In  due  time  we 
shall  reap  if  we  faint  not.  Long  may  you  continue  to  cherish  the  manly  feelings 
which  you  express  in  conclusion.  They  lead  to  respectability  at  least  from  the  world, 
and,  what  is  far  better,  to  sunshine  within  which  nothing  can  destroy  or  eclipse. 

In  the  same  packet  Carlyle  inclosed  a  letter  to  his  mother. 

I  know  well  and  feel  deeply  that  you  entertain  the  most  solicitous  anxiety  about  my 
temporal,  and  still. more  about  my  eternal  welfare  ;  as  to  the  former  of  which  I  have 
still  hopes  that  all  your  tenderness  will  yet  be  repaid  ;  and  as  to  the  latter,  though  it 
becomes  not  the  human  worm  to  boast,  I  would  fain  persuade  you  not  to  entertain  so 
many  doubts.  Your  character  and  mine  are  far  more  similar  than  you  imagine  ;  and 
our  opinions  too,  though  clothed  in  different  garbs,  are,  I  well  kuow,  still  analogous  at 
bottom.  I  respect  your  religious  sentiments  and  honor  you  for  feeling  them  more 
than  if  you  were  the  highest  woman  in  the  world  without  them.  Be  easy,  I  entreat 
you,  on  my  account ;  the  world  will  use  me  better  than  before  ;  and  if  it  should  not, 
let  us  hope  to  meet  in  that  upper  country,  when  the  vain  fever  of  life  is  gone  by,  in 
the  country  where  all  darkness  shall  be  light,  and  where  the  exercise  of  our  affections 
will  not  be  thwarted  by  the  infirmities  of  human  nature  any  more.  Brewster  will  give 
me  articles  enough.  Meanwhile  my  living  here  is  not  to  cost  me  anything,  at  least  for 
a  season  more  or  less.  I  have  two  hours  of  teaching,  which  both  gives  me  a  call  to  walk 
and  brings  in  four  guineas  a  month. 

Again  a  few  weeks  later : — 

T.  Carlyle  to  Mrs.  Carlyle, 

Jan.  30,  iSai. 

My  employment,  you  are  aware,  is  still  very  fluctuating,  but  this  I  trust  will  improve. 
I  am  advancing,  I  think,  though  leisurely,  and  at  last  I  feel  no  insuperable  doubts 
of  getting  honest  bread,  which  is  all  I  want.  For  as  to  fame  and  all  that,  I  see  it 
already  to  be'  nothing  better  than  a  meteor,  a  will-o'-the-wisp,  which  leads  one  on 
through  quagmires  and  pitfalls  to  catch  an  object  which,  when  we  have  caught  it, 
turns  out  to  be  nothing.  I  am  happy  to  think  in  the  meantime  that  you  do  not  feel 
uneasy  about  my  future  destiny.  Providence,  as  you  observe,  will  order  it  better  or 
worse,  and  with  His  award,  so  nothing  mean  or  wicked  lie  before  me,  I  shall  study  to 
rest  satisfied. 

It  is  a  striking  thing,  and  an  alarming,  to  those  who  are  at  ease  in  the  world,  to  think 
how  many  living  beings  that  had  breath  and  hope  within  them  when  I  left  Ecclefechan 
are  now  numbered  with  the  clods  of  the  valley  1  Surely-  there  is  something  obstinately 
stupid  in  the  heart  of  man,  or  the  flight  of  threescore  years,  and  the  poor  joys  or  poorer 
cares  of  this  our  pilgrimage  would  never  move  us  as  they  do.  Why  do  we  fret  and 
murmur,  and  toil,  and  consume  ourselves  for  objects  so  transient  and  frail  ?  Is  it  that 
the  soul  living  here  as  in  her  prison-house  strives  after  something  boundless  like  her- 
self, and  finding  it  nowhere  still  renews  the  search  ?  Surely  we  are  fearfully  and  won- 
derfully made.  But  I  must  not  pursue  these  speculations,  though  they  force  themselves 
upon  us  sometimes  even  without  our  asking. 

To  his  family  Carlyle  made  the  best  of  his  situation ;  and, 
indeed,  so  far  as  outward  circumstances  were  concerned,  there 
was  no  Special  cause  for  anxiety.  His  farmhouse  training 
had  mide  him  indifferent  to  luxuries,  and  he  was  earning  a'^ 


536 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 


much  money  as  he  required.  It  was  not  there  that  he  pinch 
lay;  it  was  in  the  still  uncompleted  "temptations  in  the 
wilderness,"  in  the  mental  uncertainties  which  gave  him 
neither  peace  nor  respite.  He  had  no  friend  in  Edinburgh 
with  whom  he  could  exchange  thoughts,  and  no  society  to 
amuse  or  distract  him.  And  those  who  knew  his  condition 
best,  the  faithful  Irving  especially,  became  seriously  alarmed 
for  him.  So  keenly  Irving  felt  the  danger  that  in  December 
he  even  invited  Carlyle  to  abandon  Edinburgh  altogether  and 
be  his  own  guest  for  an  indefinite  time  at  Glasgow. 

You  make  mc  too  proud  of  myself  (he  wrote)  when  you  connect  me  so  much  with 
your  happiness.  Would  that  I  could  contribute  to  it  as  I  most  fondly  wish,  and  one  of 
the  richest  and  most  powerful  minds  1  know  should  not  now  be  struggling  with  obscur- 
ity and  a  thousand  obstacles.  And  yet,  if  I  had  the  power,  I  do  not  see  by  what' 
means  I  should  cause  it  to  be  known  ;  your  mind,  unfortunately  for  its  present  peace, 
has  taken  in  so  wide  a  range  of  study  as  to  be  almost  incapable  of  professional  tram* 
mels ;  and  it  has  nourished  so  uncommon  and  so  unyielding  a  character,  as  first  unfits 
you  for,  and  then  disgusts  you  with,  any  accommodations  which  would  procure  favor 
and  patronage.  The  race  which  you  have  run  these  last  years  pains  me  even  to  think 
upon  it,  and  if  it  should  be  continued  a  little  longer,  I  pray  God  to  give  you  strength 
t<f  endure  it.  We  calculate  upon  seeing  you  at  Christmas,  and  till  then  you  can  think 
of  what  I  now  propose — that  instead  of  wearying  yourself  with  endless  vexations  which, 
are  more  than  you  can  bear,  you  will  consent  to  spend  not  a  few  weeks,  but  a  few 
months,  here  under  my  roof,  where  enjoying  at  least  wholesome  conversation  and  the 
sight  of  real  friends,  you  may  undertake  some  literary  employment  which  may  present 
you  in  a  fairer  aspect  to  the  public  than  any  you  have  hitherto  taken  before  them. 
Now  I  know  it  is  quite  Scottish  for  you  to  refuse  this  upon  the  score  of  troubling  me : 
but  trouble  to  me  it  is  none  ;  and  if  it  were  a  thousand  times  more,  would  I  not  esteem 
it  well  bestowed  upon  you  and  most  highly  rewarded  by  your  company  and  conversa- 
tion ?  I  should  esteem  it  an  honor  that  your  first  sally  in  arms  went  forth  from  my 
habitation. 

Well  might  Carlyle  cherish  Irving's  memory.  Never  had 
he  or  any  man  a  truer-hearted,  more  generous  friend.  The 
offer  could  not  be  accepted.  Carlyle  was  determined  before 
all  things  to  earn  his  own  bread,  and  he  would  not  abandon 
his  pupil  work.  Christmas  he  did  spend  at  Glasgow,  but  he 
was  soon  back  again.  He  was  corresponding  now  with 
London  booksellers,  offering  a  complete  translation  of  Schiller 
for  one  thing,  to  which  the  answer  had  been  an  abrupt  No. 
Captain  Basil  Hall,  on  the  other  hand,  havmg  heard  of  Car- 
lyle, tried  to  attach  him  to  himself,  a  sort  of  scientific  com- 
panion on  easy  terms — Carlyle   to  do   observations 'which 


THE  EARLY  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE,  53/ 

Captain  Hall  was  to  send  to  the  Admiralty  as  his  own,  and  to 

have  in  return  the  advantage  of  philosophical  society,  etc.,  to 

which  his  answer  had  in  like  manner  been   negative.    His 

letters  show  him  still  suffering  from  mental  fever,  though  with 

glimpses  of  purer  light. 

Thomas  Carlyle  to  John  Carlyle. 

Edinburgh,  March  9,  z89z« 
It  is  a  shame  and  misery  to  me  at  this  age  to  be  gliding  about  ,in  strenuous  idleness, 
with  no  hand  in  the  game  of  life  where  I  have  yet  so  much  to  win,  no  outlet  for  the 
restless  faculties  which  are  up  in  mutiny  and  slaying  one  another  for  lack  of  fair 
enemies.  I  must  do  or  die  then,  as  the  song  goes.  Edinburgh,  with  all  its  drawbacks, 
Is  the  only  scene  for  me.  In  the  country  I  am  like  an  alien,  a  stranger  and  pilgrim, 
from  a  far-distant  land.  I  must  endeavor  most  sternly,  for  this  state  of  things  cannot 
last,  and  if  health  do  but  revisit  me,  as  I  know  she  will,  it  shall  ere  long  give  place  to  a 
better.  If  I  grow  seriously  ill,  indeed,  it  will  be  different,  but  when  once  the  weather 
is  settled  and  dry,  exercise  and  care  will  restore  me  completely.  I  am  considerably 
clearer  than  I  was,  and  I  should  have  been  still  more  so  had  not  this  afternoon  been 
wet,  and  so  prevented  me  from  breathing  the  air  of  Arthur's  Seat,  a  mountain  close 
beside  us,  where  the  atmosphere  is  pure  as  a  diamond,  and  the  prospect  grander  than 
any  you  ever  saw.  The  blue  majestic  everlasting  ocean,  with  the  Fife  hills  swelling 
gradually  into  the  Grampians  behind  ;  rough  crags  and  rude  precipices  at  our  feet 
(where  not  a  hillock  rears  its  head  unsung),  with  Edinburgh  at  their  base  clustering 
proudly  over  her  rugged  foundations,  and  covering  with  a  vapory  mantle  tKe  jagged 
black  venerable  masses  of  stonework  that  stretch  far  and  wide  and  show  like  a  city  of 
Fairyland.  .  .  .  I  saw  it  all  last  evening  when  the  sun  was  going  down,  and  the  moon's 
fine  crescent,  like  a  pretty  silver  creature  as  it  is,  was  riding  quietly  above  me.  Such  a 
sight  does  one  good.  But  I  am  leading  you  astray  after  my  fantasies  when  I  should 
be  inditing  plain  prose. 

The  gloomy  period  of  Carlyle's  life — a  period  on  which  he 
said  that  he  ever  looked  back  with  a  kind  of  horror — was 
drawing  to  its  close,  this  letter,  among  other  symptoms, 
showing  that  the  natural  strength  of  his  intellect  was  assert- 
ing itself.  Better  prospects  were  opening;  more  regular 
literary  employment ;  an  offer,  if  he  chose  to  accept  it,  from 
his  friend  Mr.  Swan,  of  a  tutorship  at  least  more  satisfactory 
than  the  Yorkshire  one.  His  mother's  affection  was  more 
precious  to  him,  however  simply  expressed,  than  any  other 
form  of  earthly  consolation. 

Mrs,  Carlyle  to  Thomas  Carlyle. 

Mainhill,  March  21,  1821. 
Son  Tom» — I  received  your  kind  and  pleasant  letter.    Nothing  is  more  satisfying  to 
me  than  to  liear  of  your  welfare.    Keep  up  your  heart,  my  brave  boy.    You  ask  kindly 
pfter  mv  health.    I  complain  as  little  as  possible.    When  the  day  is  cheerier^  it  has 


538 


THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 


great  effect  on  me.  But  upon  the  whole  I  am  as  well  as  I  can  expect,  thank  God.  I 
have  sent  a  little  butter  and  a  few  cakes  with  a  box  to  bring  home  your  clothes.  Send 
them  all  home  that  I  may  wash  and  sort  them  once  more.  Oh,  man,  could  I  but  write  1 
I'll  tell  ye  a'  when  we  meet,  but  I  must  in  the  meantime  content  myself.  Do  send  me 
a  long  letter ;  it  revives  me  greatly ;  and  tell  me  honestly  if  you  read  your  chapter 
e*en  and  mom,  lad.  You  mind  I  hod  if  not  your  hand,  I  hod  your  foot  of  it.  Tell 
me  if  there  is  anything  you  want  in  particular.     I  ihust  run  to  pack  the  box,  so  I  am 

'  Your  affectionate  mother, 

Marga&st  Caklylb. 

Irving  was  still  anxious.  To  him  Carlyle  laid  himself  bare 
in  all  his  shifting  moods,  now  complaining,  now  railing  at 
himself  for  want  of  manliness.  Irving  soothed  him  as  he 
could,  always  avoiding  preachment. 

I  see  (he  wrote*)  you  have  much  to  bear,  and  perhaps  it  may  be  a  time  before  you 
■  clear  yourself  of  that  sickness  of  the  heart  which  afflicts  you  ;  but  strongly  I  feel  as- 
sured it  will  ttot  master  you  ;  that  you  will  rise  strongly  above  it  and  reach  the  place 
your  genius  destines  you  to.  Most  falsely  do  you  judge  yourself  when  you  seek  such 
degrading  similitudes  to  represent  what  you  call  your  '*  whining."  And  I  pray  you 
may  not  again  talk  of  your  distresses  in  so  desperate,  and  to  me  disagreeable,  manner. 
My  dear  sir,  is  it  to  be  doubted  that  you  are  suffering  grievously  the  want  of  spiritual 
communion,  the  bread  and  water  of  the  soul?  And  why,  then,  do  you,  as  it  were, 
mock  at  your  calamity  or  treat  it  jestingly  ?  I  declare  this  is  a  sore  offense.  You  al- 
together mistake  at  least  my  feeling  if  you  think  I  have  anything  but  the  kindest  sym- 
pathy in  your  case,  in  which  sympathy  I  am  sure  there  is  nothing  degrading,  either  to 
you  or  to  me.  Else  were  I  degraded  every  time  I  visit  a  sick  bed  in  endeavoring  to 
draw  forth  the  case  of  a  sufferer  from  his  own  lips  that  I  may,  if  possible,  administer 
some  spiritual  consolation.  But  oh !  I  would  be  angry,  or  rather  I  should  have  a 
shudder  of  unnatural  feeling,  if  the  sick  man  were  to  make  a  mockeiy  to  me  of  his 
case  or  to  deride  himself  for  making  it  known  to  any  physician  of  body  or  mind.  Ex- 
cuse my  freedom,  Carlyle.  I  do  this  in  justification  of  my  own  state  of  mind  towards 
your  distress.  I  feel  for  your  condition  as  a  brother  would  feel,  and  tosee  you  silent 
about  it  were  the  greatest  access  of  painful  emotion  which  you  could  cause  me.  I 
hope  soon  to  look  I)ack  with  you  over  this  scene  of  trials  as  the  soldier  does  over  a  hard 
campaign,  or  the  restored  captives  do  over  their  days  of  imprisonment. 

Again,  on  the  receipt  of  some  better  account  of  his  friend's 
condition,  Irving  wrote  on  the  26th  of  April  :— 

I  am  beginning  to  see  the  dawn  of  the  day  when  you  shall  be  plucked  by  the  literary 
world  from  my  solitary,  and  therefore  more  clear,  admiration  ;  and  when  from  almost 
a  monopoly  I  shall  have  nothing  but  a  mere  shred  of  your  praise.  They  will  unearth 
you,  and  for  your  sake  I  will  rejoice,  though  for  my  own,  I  may  regret.  But  I  shall 
always  have  the  pleasant  superiority  that  I  was  your  friend  and  admirer,  through 
good  and  through  bad  report,  to  continue,  so  I  hope,  until  the  end.  Yet  our  honest 
Demosthenes,  or  shalll  call  him  Chrysostom  (Boanerges  would  fit  him  better),t  seems 
to  have  caught  some  glimpse  of  your  inner  man,  though  lie  had  few  opportunities ; 
for  he  never  ceases  to  be  inquiring  after  you.  You  will  soon  shift  your  quarters, 
though  for  the  present  I  think  your  motto  should  be,  **  Better  a  wee  bush  than  na 
bield."    If  you  are  going  to  revert  to  teaching  again,  which  I  heartily  deprecate,  I 

♦  March  15,  x8ai.  +  Dr.  Chalmers.  , 


^:1UJ 


.      THE  EARL  Y  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  CARL  YLE.        539 

know  nothing  better  than  Swan's  conception,  although  success  in  it  depends  mainly 
upon  offset  and  address,  and  the  studying  of  humors,  which,  though  it  be  a  good 
enough  way  of  its  kind,  is  not  the.  way  to  which  I  think  you  should  yet  condescend. 

Friends  and  family"  might  console  and  advise,  but  Carlyle 
himself  could  alone  conquer  the  spiritual  maladies  which  were 
the  real  cause  of  his  distraction.  In  June  of  this  year,  1821, 
was  transacted  .what  in  Sartor  Resartus  he  describes  as  his 
"conversion,"  or  "  new  birth,**' when  he  " authentically  took 
the  devil  by  the  nose,*'  when  he  achieved  finally  the  convic- 
tions, positive  and  negative,  by  which  the  whole  of  his  later 
life  was  governed. 

Nothing  in  "  Sartor  Resartus  "  (he  says)  is  fact ;  symbolical  myth  all,  except  that  of 
the  incident  in  the  Rue  St.  Thomas  de  I'Enfer,  which  occurred  quite  literally  to  myself 
in  Leith  Walk,  during  three  weeks  of  total  sleeplessness,  in  which  almost  my  one 
solace  was  that  of  a  daily  bathe  on  the  sands  between  Leitli  and  Purtobello.  Incident 
was  as  I  went  down  ;  coming  up  I  generally  felt  refreshed  for  the  hour.  I  ramember 
it  wellf  and  could  go  straight  to  about  the  place. 

As  the  incident  is  thus  authenticated,  I  may  borrow  the 
words  in  which  it  is  described,  and  so  close  what  may  be 
called  the  period  of  Carlyle's  apprenticeship. 

But  for  me  so  strangely  unprosperous  had  I  been,  the  net  result  of  my  workings 
amounted  as  yet  simply  to— nothing.  How,  then,  could  I  believe  in  my  strength  when 
there  was  as  yet  no  mirror  to  see  it  in  ?  Ever  did  this  agitating,  yet,  as  I  now  per- 
ceive, quite  frivolous,  question  remain  to  me  insoluble  :  Hast  thou  a  certain  faculty,  a 
certain  worth,  such  as  even  the  most  have  not ;  or  art  thou  the  completest  dullard  of 
these  modern  times  ?  Alas,  the  fearful  unbelief  is  unbelief  in  yourself ;  and  how 
could  I  believe  ?  Had  not  my  first  last  faith  in  myself,  when  even  to  me  the  heavens 
seemed  laid  open,  and  I  dared  to  love,  been  all  too  cruelly  belied  ?  The  speculative 
mystery  of  life  grew  ever  more  mysterious  to  me :  neither  in  the  practical  mystery 
had  I  made  the  slightest  progress,  but  been  everywhere  buffeted,  foiled,  and  con- 
temptuously cast  out.  A  feeble  unit  in  the  middle  of  a  threatening  infinitude,  I 
seemed  to  have  nothing  given  me  but  eyes  whereby  to  discern  my  own  wretchedness. 
Invisible  yet  impenetrable  walls,  as  of  enchantment,  divide  me  from  all  living.  Now 
when  I  look  back  it  was  a  strange  isolation  I  then  lived  in.  The  men  and  women 
round  me,  even  speaking  with  me,  were  but  figures ;  I  had  practically  forgotten  that 
they  were  alive,  that  they  were  not  merely  automatic.  In  the  midst  of  their  crowded 
streets  and  assemblages,  I  walked  solitary,  and  (except  as  it  was  my  own  heart,  not 
another's,  that  I  kept  devouring)  savs^e  also  as  the  tiger  in  his  jungle.  Some  comfort 
it  would  have  been  could  I,  like  Faust,  have  fancied  myself  tempted  and  tormented  by 
the  devil ;  for  a  hell  as  I  imagine,  without  life,  though  only  diabolical  life,  were  more 
frightful :  but  in  our  age  of  downpulling  and  disbelief,  the  very  devil  has  been  pulled 
down,  you  cannot  so  much  as  believe  in  a  devil.  To  me  the  universe  was  all  void  of 
life,  of  purpose,  of  volition,  even  of  hostility:  it  was  one  huge,  dead,  immeasurable 
sfeam-engine,  rolling  on  in  its  dead  indifference,  to  grind  me  limb  from  limb.  Oh,  the 
vast  gloomy,  solitary  Golgotha  and  mill  of  death  !  Why  was  the  living  banished 
thither  companionlcss,  conscious  ?    Why,  if  there  b  no  devil,  nay,  unless  the  devil  is 


540  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE. 

your  god  ?  From  suicide  a  certain  aftershine  (Nachschein)  of  Christianity  witlihdd 
me,  perhaps  also  a  certain  indolence  of  character  ;  for  was  not  that  a  remedy  I  had  at 
any  time  within  reach  ?  Often,  however,  there  was  a  question  present  to  me :  should 
some  one  now  at  the  turning  of  that  corner  blow  thee  suddenly  out  of  space  into  the 
other  world  or  other  no-world,  by  pistol-shot,  how  were  it  ?  .  .  . 

So  had  it  lasted,  as  in  bitter  protracted  death-agony  through  long  years.  The  heart 
within  me,  unvisited  by  any  heavenly  dewdrop,  was  smoldering  in  sulphurous  slow- 
consuming  fire.  Almost  since  earliest  memory  I  had  shed  no  tear ;  or  once  only  when 
I,  murmuring  half  audibly,  recited  Faust's  death-song,  that  w^ld  $elig  der,  den  er  im 
Siegesglanze  findet,  happy  whom  he  finds  in  battlers  splendor,  and  thought  that  of 
this  last  friend  even  I  was  not  forsaken,  that  destiny  itself  could  not  doom  me  to  die. 
Having  no  hope,  neither  had  I  any  definite  fear,  were  it  of  man  or  devil ;  nay,  I  often  felt 
as  if  it  mightbesolacingcould  the  arch-devil  himself ,  though  in  Tartarean  terrors,  but 
rise  to  me,  that  I  might  tell  him  a  little  of  my  mind.  And  yet,  strangely  enough,  I  lived 
in  a  continual  indefinite  pining  fear ;  tremulous,  pusillanimous  apprehension  of  1  knew 
not  what.  It  seemed  as  if  all  things  in  the  heavens  above  and  the  earth  beneath  would 
hurt  me ;  as  if  the  heavens  and  earth  were  but  boundless  jaws  of  a  devouring  monster, 
wherein  I  palpitatingly  waited  to  be  devoured.  Full  of  such  humor  was  I  one  sultry  dog 
day  after  much  perambulation  toiling  along  the  dirty  little  Rue  St.  Thomas  de  I'Enfer 
in  a  close  atmosphere  and  over  pavements  hot  as  Nebuchadnezzar's  furnace ;  whereby 
doubtless  my  spirits  were  little  cheered  ;  when  all  at  once  there  rose  a  thought  in  aae, 
and  I  asked  myself :  ^  What  art  thou  afraid  of  ?  wherefore,  like  a  coward,  dost  thou 
for  ever  pip  and  whimper,  and  go  cowering  and  trembling  ?  Despicable  biped !  what 
is  the  sum  total  of  the  worst  that  lies  before  thee  ?  Death  ?  Well,  death  ;  and  say  the 
pangs  of  Tophet  too,  and  all  that  the  devil  and  man  may,  will,  or  can  do  against  thee  I 
Hast  thou  not  a  heart  ?  canst  thou  no  suffer  whatsoever  it  be  ;  and  as  a  child  of  free- 
dom, though  outcast,  trample  Tophet  itself  under  thy  feet,  while  it  consumes  thee? 
Let  it  come,  then,  and  I  will  meet  it  and  defy  it.'  And  as  I  so  thought,  there  rushed 
like  a  stream  of  fire  over  my  whole  soul,  and  1  shook  base  fear  away  from  me  for  ever. 
I  was  strong  ;  of  unknown  strength  ;  a  spirit ;  almost  a  god.  Ever  from  that  time, 
the  temper  of  my  misery  was  changed  ;  not  fear  or  whining  sorrow  was  it,  but  indigna- 
tion and  grim  fire-eyed  defiance. 

Thus  had  the  everlasting  No  (Mas  ewige  Nein^)  pealed  authoratively  through  all  the 
recesses  of  my  being,  of  my  Me  ;  and  then  it  was  that  my  Me  stood  up  in  native  god- 
created  majesty,  and  with  emphasis  recorded  its  protest.  Such  a  protest,  the  most 
important  transaction  in  my  life,  may  that  same  indignation  and  defiance,  in  a  psycho- 
logical point  of  view,  be  fitly  called.  The  everlasting  No  had  said :  Behold,  thou  art 
fatherless,  outcast,  and  the  universe  is  mine  (the  devil's)  ;  to  which  my  whole  Mb  bow 
made  answer:  /am  not  thine  but  free,  and  forever  hate  thee. 

It  is  from  this  hour  I  incline  to  date  my  spiritual  new  birth:  perhaps  I  directly 
thereupon  began  to  be  a  man. 

Note  to  Mr,  Froude*s  article, 
[The  subjoined  note  was  received  from  Mr.  Froude  after  his 
article  had  been  sent  to  press. — Ed.] 

I  was  not  aware,  until  this  article  was  printed,  that  a  son  of  Edward  Irving  was 
now  alive  in  Australia.  This  gentleman  ought  to  have  been  consulted  before  any  of 
his  father's  letters  were  published  ;  and  although  the  letters  which  I  have  here  intro- 
duced are  supremely  honorable  to  their  writer,  I  owe  Mr.  Martin  Irving  an  apokcT 
for  my  involuntary  negligence.  J.  A.  Froudb. 

June  27, 1881. 

\J.  A.  Froude,  in  The  Nineteenth  Century. 


■t 


^ 


I 


ANECDOTES  OF  BIBLES.  541 


ANECDOTES  OF  BIBLES. 

In  view  of  the  recent  publication  of  a  revised  translation  of 
the  New  Testament,  it  may  not  prove  uninteresting  to  glance 
at  the  many  curious  vicissitudes  which  have  befallen  the 
early  translations  and  editions  of  the  Bible ;  for  the  early  edi- 
tions of  the  Book,  which  should  always  have  commanded  the 
most  anjcious  solicitude,  were  not  even  favored  with  the  care 
and  attention  now  bestowed  on  a  halfpenny  newspaper.  In 
the  early  days  of  printing,  the  necessity  of  carefully  revising 
the  printers*  work  could  not  have  been  realized,  for  it  seems 
to  have  been  a  difficult  matter  to  get  a  book  through  the 
press,  particularly  a  large  book  like  the  Bible,  without  a  great 
number  of  errata.  Small  books  even,  were  not  so  exempt 
from  blunders  as  we  might  suppose.  A  thin  octavo  volume 
of  one  hundred  and  seventy-two  pages,  entitled  "  The  An- 
atomy of  the  Mass,"  was  published  in  1561,  which  was  followed 
by  fifteen  pages  of  errata  I  The  pious  monk  who  wrote  it  in- 
forms his  readers  in  the  Preface  to  the  Errata  that  the  blun- 
ders in  his  little  book  were  caused  by  the  machinations  of 
Satan  I 

During  the  Commonwealth,  and  even  a  short  time  before 
Charles  I.'s  execution,  the  printers,  in  order  to  meet  the  great 
demand  which  then  existed,  sent  out  Bibles  from  their  presses 
as  quickly  as  they  could,  regardless  of  errors  and  omissions. 
One  of  the  Harleian  Manuscripts  relates  that  the  learned 
Archbishop  Usher  while  on  his  way  to  preach  at  Paul's  Cross 
— ^a  wooden  pulpit  adjoining  the  Cathedral  of  St.  Paul's,  in 
which  the  most  eminent  divines  were  appointed  to  preach 
every  Sunday  morning — ^went  into  a  bookseller's  shop  and 
inquired  for  a  Bible  of  the  London  edition.  He  was  horrified 
to  discover  that  the  text  from  which  he  was  to  preach  was 
omitted  !  This  formed  the  first  complaint  to  the  king  of  the 
careless  manner  in  which  Bibles  were  printed ;  and  as  one  of 


.54^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

the  results,  the  printing  of  them  was  created  a  monopoly.  A 
great  competition  then  arose  between  the  king's  printers  of 
London  and  those  of  the  University  of  Cambridge.  The 
privilege  of  printing  Bibles  was  at  a  later  date  conceded  to 
one  William  Bentley  ;  but  he  was  opposed  by  Hills  and  Field ; 
and  many  paper  altercations  took  place  between  them.  The 
Pearl  Bible  of  Field,  printed  in  1653,  is  perhaps  the  most 
blundering  Bible  ever  issued.  A  manuscript  in  the  British 
•  Museum  affirms  that  one  of  these  Bibles  swarmed  with  six 
thousand  faults.  In  Garrard's  Letter  to  the  Earl  of  Strafford^ 
it  is  said :  "Sterne,  a  solid  scholar,  was  the  first  who  summed 
up  the  three  thousand  and  six  hundred  faults  that  were  in 
our  printed  Bibles  of  London."  The  name  Pearl  given  to 
this  book  by  collectors,  and  a  copy  of  which  is  to  be  found  in 
the  British  Museum,  is  derived  from  the  printers'  name  for 
a  diminutive  kind  of  type.  It  must  not  be  supposed  that 
those  many  "  faults  "  were  all  printers'  errors  only,  for  it  is 
well  known  that  Field  was  an  unscrupulous  forger.  He  is 
said  to  have  been  paid  fifteen  hundred  pounds  by  the  Inde- 
pendents to  corrupt  a  text  in  Acts  vi.  3  by  substituting  a  "ye" 
for  a  "we,"  to  sanction  the  right  of  the  people  to  appoint 
their  own  pastors.  Two  errata  may  also  be  mentioned.  In 
Romans  vi.  13,  "righteousness  "was  printed  for"  unrighteous- 
ness"; and  at  First  Corinthians  vi.  9,  a  **not*'  was  omitted,  so 
that  the  text  read — "The  unrighteous  shall  inherit  the  king- 
dom of  God." 

Before  and  during  the  Civil  War,  a  large  number  of  Bibles 
were  printed  in  Holland  in  the  English  language,  and  im- 
ported to  this  country.  As  this  violated  the  rights  of  the 
"  king's  printers,"  twelve  thousand  of  those  duodecimo  Dutch 
Bibles  were  seized  and  destroyed.  A  large  impression  of  the 
same  smuggled  Bibles  was  burned  by  arder  of  the  Assembly 
of  Divines  for  errors  such  as  the  following— the  worts  in 
brackets  being  those  in  the  Authorised  Version:  Genel 
xxxvi.  24,  "This  is  that  ass  [Anah]  that  found  the  rule, 


i: 


aJStecdo  tes  of  bibles,  543 

[mules]  in  the  wilderness ; "  Luke  xxi.  28,  *'  Look  up,  lift  up 
your  hands  [heads];  for  your  condemnation  [redemption] 
draweth  nigh/*  It  may  be  added,  in  the  case  of  the  passage 
from  Genesis,  that  the  correctors,  as  well  as  the  corrected, 
were  wrong.  Anah  neither  found  '•  rulers  **  nor  "  mules  "  in 
the  wilderness,  but  simply  "warm  springs,"  as  our  future 
Bibles  will  have  it.  The  Vulgate,  or  Latin  Bible,  notwith- 
standing its  other  faults,  has  the  jjassage  correct :  "  Iste  est 
Ana  qui  invenit  aquas  calidas  in  solitudine."  (This  is  Anah 
who  found  warm  springs  in  the  desert.) 

Anthony  Bennemere  printed  a  Bible  in  French  at  Paris,  in 
1538,  in  the  reign  of  Francis  L  He  says  in  his  preface  that 
this  Bible  was  originally  printed  at  the  request  of  His  Most 
Christian  Majesty  Charles  VIIL  in  1495,  ^^^  that  the  French 
translator  "  has  added  nothing  but  the  genuine  truth,  accord- 
ing to  the  express  terms  of  the  Latin  Bible,  nor  omitted  any- 
thing but  what  was  improper  to  be  translated."  Yet  the 
following  is  interwoven  with  the  thirty-second  chapter  of  Ex- 
odus at  the  twentieth  verse :  "  The  ashes  of  the  golden  calf 
which  Moses  caused  to  be  burned,  and  mixed  with  the  water 
that  was  drunk  by  the  Israelites,  stuck  to  the  beards  of  such 
as  had  fallen  down  before  it ;  by  which  they  appeared  with 
gilt  beards,  as  a  peculiar  mark  to  distinguish  those  which  had 
worshiped  the  calf."  Another  .interpolation  of  a  similar  na- 
ture was  also  made  in  the  same  chapter :  "  Upon  Aaron's  re- 
fusing to  make  gods  for  the  Israelites,  they  spat  upon  him, 
with  so  much  fury  and  violence  that  they  quite  suffocated 
him."  We  may  also  note  the  fact  that  the  three  thousand 
men  stated,  in  the  twenty-eighth  verse  of  Exodus  xxxii.  of  the 
Authorized  Version,  to  have  been  slain,  is  increased  by  the 
Mohammedan  commentators  of  the  Koran  to  seventy  thou- 
sand ;  and  in  the  Latin  Bible  known  as  the  Vulgate,  the  num- 
ber is  stated  to  be  twenty-three  thousand. 

The  Vulgate  of  Pope  Sixtus  V.  comes  near  to,  if  it  does  not 
equal,  Field's  Pearl   Bible  in  the  multiplicity  of  its  errors. 


544  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

This  pope,  who  ascended  the  chair  in  1 585,  was  resolved  to 
have  a  correct  and  carefully  printed  Bible.  He  specially  re- 
vised and  corrected  every  sheet;  and  on  its  publication  pre- 
fixed to  the  first  edition  a  Bull  excommunicating  all  printers 
who  in  reprinting  should  make  any  alteration  in  the  text. 
Yet  the  book  so  swarmed  with  blunders,  that  a  number  of 
scraps  had  to  be  printed  for  the  purpose  of  being;,pasted  over 
the  erroneous  passages,  giving  the  true  text.  The  heretics  of 
course  exulted  in  this  flagrant  proof  of  papal  infallibility !  A 
copy  of  this  "  Scrap  Book  "  was  sold  some  time  since  for- 
sixty  guineas. 

There  are  several  "  Treacle  Bibles  "  known  to  book-collec- 
tors. The  edition  of  May  1541  of  Cranmer's  Bible,  at  Jere- 
miah viii.  22,  asks :  *'  Is  there  no  Tryacle  at  Gilead  ?  Is  there 
no  phisycypn  there  ?  "  There  also  appeared  a  "  Rosin  "  Bible 
m  which  that  word  was  substituted  for  treacle ;  and  &  "  Bug  " 
Bible,  because  that  unpleasant  insect  was  said  by  the  printers 
to  be  the  "  Terror  by  night "  mentioned  in  the  fifth  verse  of 
Psalm  xci.  The  "  Vinegar  "  Bible,  printed  at  the  Clarendon 
Press,  Oxford,  in  1717*  is  so  called  from  the  twentieth  chapter 
of  Luke's  Gospel  being  said  to  contain  "  The  Parable  of  the 
Vinegar  "  (instead  of  "  Vineyard  '*)  in  the  summary  of  con- 
tents at  the  head  of  the  chapter.  It  was  looked  upon  as  a 
good  joke  in  the  times  of  political  corruption  when  Matthew 
(v.  9)  was  made  to  say,  "  Blessed  are  the  ^/ar^r^-makers."  The 
"  Breeches  *'  Bible,  printed  at  Geneva  in  1550,  said  at  Genesis 
iii.  7,  that  Adam  and  Eve  " made  themselves  breeches"  This 
version  is  as  old  as  Wycliffe's  time,  and  appears  in  his  Bible. 
Some  curious  changes  in  the  uses  of  words  have  taken  place 
even  since  the  date  of  the  Authorized  Version.  For  instance 
the  word  "prevent,"  which  in  the  seventeenth  century  meant, 
and  ought  still  to  mean,  "to  anticipate."  It  is  derived  from 
the  Latin  praevenire,  "to  come  befofe,"and  in  the  Authorized 
Version  never  means  "  to  hinder."  Shakespeare  uses  "  pre- 
vent "  for  "  anticipate  "  in  "Julius  Caesar,"  v.  i. ;  and  Bums  in 


ANECDOTES  OF  BIBLES.  545 

» 
his  '*  Cottar's  Saturday  Night."  A  printer's  error  in  the  Author- 
ized Version  which  has  been  allowed  to  remain,  may  be  noted 
in  this  place :  the  letter  s  has  been  prefixed  without  authority 
to  the  word  "  neezed  "  in  Second  Kings  iv.  35.  It  is  printed 
correctly  (neesings)  in  the  only  other  place  where  it  occurs, 
at  Job  xli.  18.  "  Neeze  "  is  also  to  be  found  in  "A  Midsum- 
mer Night's  Dream,"  ii.  i. 

In  1816  some  revision  and  correction  was  attempted  with 
partial  success:  but  the  two  Cambridge  Bibles  of  1629  and 
1638  were  the  first  which  were  printed  with  tolerable  correct- 
ness. The  edition  of  1638  is  said  to  have  been  revised  at  the 
king's  command  by  several  learned  men  of  Cambridge,  such 
as  Dr.  Ward,  Dr.  Goad  and  others.  Buck  and  Daniel,  the 
University  printers,  were  50  confident  of  its  correctness,  that 
they  challenged  all  Cambridge  by  a  bill  affixed  to  the  door  of 
St.  Mary's  church,  in  which  they  offered  a  copy  of  their  Bible 
to  any  scholar  who  would  find  a  literal  fault  in  it.  The  first 
person  who  publicly  noticed  any  of  its  errata  was  Dr.  William 
Wotton,  who  in  a  sermon  preached  at  Newport-Pagnell, 
Bucks,  noticed  an  error  ("  ye  "  for  "  we  ")  at  Acts  vi.  3.  An 
edition  printed  at  Oxford  in  171 1  is  remarkable  for  a  mistake 
at  Isaiah  Ivii.  12,  where  a  "  not "  is  omitted.  And  the  Oxford 
Bible  of  1792  declared  that  Philip  (instead  of  Peter)  would 
deny  Christ  before  cock-crow. 

Great  difficulty  was  experienced  by  the  early  translators 
with  the  enumeration  of  the  articles  composing  Jacob's 
present  to  Joseph  (Genesis  xliii.  1 1),  as  little  was  known  at 
that  time  of  the  botany  of  the  Holy  Land.  Tyndale  was  not 
far  wrong  in  his  version  of  the  Pentateuch  in  1530,  although 
"a  curtesye  bawlme,"  etc.,  looks  quaint  nowadays.  The 
Genevan  of  1560  and  the  Douay  of  1609  had  "  rosen  "  where 
we  now  have  "  balm."  Dr.  Geddes  introduces  "  laudanum  "  • 
among  the  presents;  but  in  his  manuscripts  in  the  Bodleian 
Library,  Wycliffe  translates  the  first  on  the  list  as  "  a  l5rtle  of 
precious  liquor  of  sibote,"  and  adds  slyly  in  the  margin  that 
L.  M. — 18 


54^  THE  Library  MAGAZINE. 

this  "precious  liquor"  is  "ginne."  A  printer's  widow  in 
Germany  thought  to  secure  the  supremacy  of  her  sex  by 
secretly  altering  the  last  clause  of  the  sixteenth  verse  of  the 
third  chaptei  of  Genesis.  By  substituting  the  letters  "  Na  '* 
for  the  first  half  of  the  word  Herr  (lord  or  master)  it  made  the 
word  read  "  Narr ; "  the  altered  text  reading,  "  And  he  shall 
be  thy  fooiy  It  is  said  this  attempt  at  "  improving  "  the  text 
cost  the  good  woman  her  life.  The  translation  of  St.  Paul's 
Epistles  in  the  Ethiopic  language  was  full  of  errors,  which  the 
editors  good-naturedly  excused  by  the  following  plea :  "  They 
who  printed  the  work  could  not  read,  and  we  could  not  print ; 
they  helped  us,  and  we  helped  them,  as  the  blind  helps  the 
blind."  Dr.  John  Jortin,  in  his  "  Remarks  on  Ecclesiastical 
History  (1754),"  notices  a  Gothic  Bishop  who  translated  the 
Scriptures  into  the  language  of  the  Goths,  omitting  the  Book 
of  Kings,  lest  the  wars  recorded  there  should  increase  their 
inclination  for  fighting. 

Dr.  Alexander  Geddes  already  referred  to,  resolved  to  un- 
dertake a  new  translation  ;  and  in  1780,  as  a  preliminary,  he 
published  a  sketch  of  his  plan  under  the  title  of  an  "  Idea  of  a 
New  Revision  of  the  Holy  Bible  for  the  Use  of  the  English 
Catholics."  In  1786,  he  published  another  "Prospectus";  in 
1787,  "An  Appendix  to  the  Prospectus," containing  "queries, 
doubts,  and  difficulties  relative  to  a  vernacular  vision  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures."  In  1788  and  following  years,  he  issued 
Proposals  for  Printing,"  and  several  "  Answers  "to  the  advice 
he  had  received.  After  all  these  preliminary  flourishes,  in 
1792  the  first  volume  appeared  of  a  translation  which  was 
never  completed.  Christians  of  every  description  rejected  it ; 
and  the  Catholics,  for  whose  benefit  it  was  intended,  were  for- 
bidden to  read  it.  Yet  another  "  Address  "  in  defense  the  fol- 
lowing year,  and  the  project  ends.  In  what  he  has  translated, 
Geddes  introduces  us  to  Hebrew  "constables,"  and  the  pass- 
over  is  rather  humorously  translated  "The  Skipover." 

From  those  blundered  editions  let  us  now  go  back  to  the 


ANECDOTES  OF  BIBLES,  $47 

first  complete  printed  Bible — that  by  John  Fust  or  Faust, 
printed  at  Mayence,  in  Germany,  in  1455.  This  munificent 
work  was  executed  with  cut-metal  types  on  six  hundred  and 
thirty-seven  leaves,  some  of  the  copies  on  fine  paper,  and 
others  on  vellum ;  and  is  sometimes  known  as  the  "  Mazarin 
Bible,"  >a  copy  having  been  unexpectedly  found  in  Cardinal 
Mazarin's  library  at  Paris.  It  is  also  called  the  "  Forty-two 
Line  Bible,"  because  each  full  column  contains  that  number 
of  lines;  and,  lastly,  as  Gutenberg's  Bible,  because  John 
Gutenberg  was  associated  with  Fust  and  Schoffer  in  its  issue. 
It  was  printed  in  Latin ;  and  the  letters  were  such  an  exact 
imitation  of  the  work  of  an  amanuensis,  that  the  copies  were 
passed  off  by  Fust,  when  he  visited  Paris,  as  manuscript,  the 
discovery  of  the  art  of  printing  being  kept  a  profound  secret. 
Fust  sold  a  copy  to  the  king  of  France  for  seven  hundred 
crowns,  and  another  to  the  Archbishop  of  Paris  for  four  hun- 
dred crowns ;  although  he  appears  to  have  charged  less  noble 
customers  as  low  as  sixty  crowns.  The  low  price  and  a  uni- 
formity of  the  lettering  of  these  Bibles,  caused  universal  as- 
tonishment. The  capital  letters  in  red  ink  were  said  to  be 
printed  with  his  blood ;  and  as  he  could  immediately  produce 
new  copies  ad  libitum,  he  was  adjudged  in  league  with  Satan. 
Fust  was  apprehended,  and  was  forced  to  reveal  the  newly 
discoverecf  art  of  printing,  to  save  himself  from  the  flames. 
This  is  supposed  to  be  the  origin  of  the  tradition  of  the 
"  Devil  3nd  Dr.  Faustus,"  dramatized  by  Christopher  Marlowe 
and  others. 

One  of  the  highest  prices — if  not  M<f  highest — realized  by  any 
book  was  for  a  copy  of  this  splendid  Bible,  at  the  sale  of  the 
" Perkins  Library"  at  Hamworth  Park,  on  6th  June,  1873.  A 
copy  on  vellum  was  sold  for  three  thousand  four  hundred 
pounds ;  another  on  paper  for  two  thousand  six  hundred  and 
ninety  pounds.  This  large  price  is  rather  surprising;  for 
there  are  about  twenty  copies  in  different  libraries,  half  of 
them  belonging  to  private  persons,  in  Britain.     Before  this 


1-8  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

lie,  the  most  expensive  bpok  was  Boccaccio's  Decameron, 
rinted  at  Venice  in  1471,  which  was  bought  at  the  Duke  of 
oxburghe's  sale  in  181 1  by  the  Marquis  of  Blandford  (Duke 
f  Marlborough),  for  two  thousand  two  hundred  and  sixty 
ounds ;  although  its  value  fell  afterwards  to  nine  hundred 
nd  eighteen  pounds  in  1819,  when  Lord  Spencer  became  its 
urchaser. 

When  Dr.  Castell  was  engaged  in  the  preparation  of  his 
olyglot  Bible,  he  was  much  patronized  by  Cromwell,  who 
llowed  the  paper  to  be  imported  free  of  duty.  It  was  pub- 
shed  during  the  Protectorate,  and  dedicated  to  Cromwell  in 
respectful  preface.  At  the  Restoration  (1660),  Cromwell's 
ame  was  omitted,  and  the  Republican  strains  Qf  the  preface 
Dned  down.  The  different  editions  are  known  as  "  Republi- 
an  "  and  "  Royal "  among  book  collectors.  At  that  time, 
lerewas  a  mania  for  dedicating  books  to  somebody — a  celeb- 
ity,  if  possible. 

Before  tjrpes  were  invented,  printing  pictures  from  engraved 
-"ooden  blocks  was  accomplished  in  the  fourteenth  century. 
tooks  were  made  of  engravings  of  the  most  remarkable  in- 
idcnts  in  the  books  of  Moses,  the  Gospels,  and  Apocalypse  ; 
iiey  were  called  "  Blblia  Pauperum,"  or  Poor  Men's  Bibles, 
air  copies  of  these  have  brought  two  hundred  and  fifty 
ounds;  and  the  very  worst,  rarely  less  than  fifty  pounds 
'he  rare  edition  of  the  "  Biblia  Grermanica,"  published  in  1487* 
ontains  many  colored  wood-cuts  remarkable  for  the  singu- 
irity  of  their  designs ;  for  instance,  Bathsheba  is  represented 
'^ashing  her  feet  in  a  tub,  and  Elijah  as  ascending  to  heave  *n 
1  a  four-wheeled  wagon!  The  Bishops'  Bible — so  called 
rom  the  fact  that  most  of  the  translators  were  bishops — ^was 
ublished  in  1568.  It  contained  a  portrait  of  the  Earl  of 
.eicester,  the  great  and  powerful  favorite  of  Elizabeth,  placed 
efore  the  Book  of  Joshua ;  whilst  another  portrait,  that  of  Sir 
Villiam  Cecil — also  a  favorite  of  the  queen — adorned  the 
*salms.    In  the  edition  of  1574,  a  map  of  the  Holy  Land, 


aftjji 


THE  FIRST  ENGLISH  POET  .  549 

the  Anns  of  Archbishop  Parker,  the  chief  translator,  wer© 
substituted. 

We  will  conclude  with  the  following  anecdotes  of  Prayer 
Books.  The  Clarendon  Press,  Oxford,  printed  in  1813  an 
edition  in  which  occurs  twice  in  the  Litany, "  O  Lamb  of  God, 
which  takest  away  the  sins  of  the  Lord"  A  copy  is  still  in 
use,  we  believe,  in  Cashel  Cathedral.  Dr.  Cotton  says  he 
has  seen  a  Prayer  Book  in  which  a  prayer  concluded  thus, 
"  Through  the  K«righteousness  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ." 

Our  last  story  is  from  an  American  newspaper  of  1776.  A 
printer  in  England  who  printed  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer, 
unluckily  omitted  the  letter  4:  in  the  word  "changed  "  in  the 
following  sentence,  "  We  shall  all  be  changed  in  the  twink- 
ling of  an  eye."  A  clergyman  not  so  attentive  to  his  duties 
a^  he  should  have  been,  read  it  to  his  congpregation  as  it  was 
printed,  thus,  "  We  shall  all  be  hanged  in  the  twinkling  of  an 
eye." 

From  Chambers's  Journal. 


\ 


THE  FIRST  ENGLISH  POET. 

Dwelt  a  certain  poor  man  in  his  day. 
Near  at  hand  to  Hilda's  holy  house, 
Learning's  lighthouse,  blessed  beacon,  built 
High  o'er  sea  and  river,  on  the  head, 
Streaneshalch  in  Anglo-Saxon  speech, 
Whitby^  after,  by  the  Norsemen  named. 
Caedmon  was  he  call'd  ;  he  came  and  went. 
Doing  humble  duties  for  the  monks. 
Helping  with  the  horses  at  behest ; 
Modest,  meek,  unmemorable  man. 
Moving  slowly  into  middle  age, 
Toiling  on, — t.welve  hundred  years  ago. 

Still  and  silent,  Csedmon  sometimes  sat 
With  the  serfs  at  lower  end  of  hall ; 


SSO  .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

There  he  marverd  much  to  hear  the  monks 
Singing  sweetly  hymns  unto  their  harp. 
Handing  it  from  each  to  each  in  turn, 
Till  his  heart-strings  trembled.      Otherwhile, 
When  the  serfs  were  merry  with  themselves, 
Sung  their  folk-songs  upon  festal  nights, 
Handing  round  the  harp  to  each  in  turn, 
Caedmon,  though  he  loved  not  lighter  songs, 
Long'd  to  sing, — but  he  could  never  sing. 

Sad  and  sileht  would  he  creep  away, 
Wander  forth  alone,  he  wist  not  why. 
Watched  the  sky  and  water,  stars  or  clouds 
Climbing  from  the  sea  ;  and  in  his  soul 
Shadows  mounted  up  and  mystic  lights. 
Echoes  vague  and  vast  return 'd  the  voice 
Of  the  rushing  river,  roaring  waves, 
Twilight's  windy  whisper  from  the  fells, 
Howl  of  brindled  wolf,  and  crj^  of  bird  ; 
Every  sight  and  sound  of  solitude 
Ever  mingling  in  a  master  thought. 
Glorious,  terrible,  of  the  Mighty  One 
Who  made  all  things.     As  the  Book  declared 
**'Inthe  Beginning  He  made  Heaven  and  Earth.** 

Thus  lived  Caedmon,  quiet  year  by  year  ; 
Listen'd,  leam'd  a  little,  as  he  could  ; 
Worked,  and  mused,  and  prayed,  and  held  his  peace. 

Toward  the  end  of  harvest  time,  the  hinds 
Held  a  feast,  and  sung  their  festal  songs. 
Handing  round  the  harp  from  each  to  each. 
But  before  it  came  where  Caedmon  sat, 
Sadly,  silently,  he  stole  away, 
Wander'd  to  the  stable-yard  and  wept. 
Weeping  laid  him  low  among  the  straw, 
Fell  asleep  at  last.     And  in  his  sleep 
Came  a  Stranger,  calling  him  by  name  : 
**  Caedmon,  sing  to  me  !  "     **  I  cannot  sing. 
Wherefore — wo  is  me  ! — I  left  the  house." 


THE  FIRST  ENGLISH  FOE  T,  551 

•*  Sing,  I  bid  thee  ! "     *'  What  then  shall  I  sing  ?  " 
**  Sing  the  Making  of  the  World."    Whereon 
Caedmon  sung :  and  when  he  woke  from  sleep 
Still  the  verses  stay'd  with  him,  and  more 
Sprang  like  fountain-water  from  a  rock 
Fed  from  never-failing  secret  springs. 

Praising  Heaveii  most  high,  but  nothing  proud, 
Csedmon  sought  the  Steward  and  told  his  tale. 
Who  to  Holy  Hilda  led  him  in. 
Pious  Princess  Hilda,  pure  of  heart. 
Ruling  Mother,  royal  Edwin's  niece. 
Caedmon  at  her  bidding  boldly  sang 
Of  the  Making  of  the  World,  in  words 
Wonderous  ;  whereupon  they  wotted  well 
'Twas  an  Angel  taught  him,  and  his  gift 
Came  direct  from  God  :  and  glad  were  they. 

Thenceforth  Holy  Hilda  greeted  him 
Brother  of  the  brotherhood.     He  grew 
Famedest  monk  of  all  the  monastery  ; 
Singing  many  high  and  holy  songs  ^ 
Folk  were  fain  to  hear,  and  loved  him  for  : 
Tin  his  death-day  came,  that  comes  to  all. 

Caedmon  bode  that  evening  in  his  bed. 
He  at  peace  with  men  and  men  with  him  ; 
Wrapt  in  comfort  of  the  Eucharist ; 
Weak  and  silent.     **  Soon  our  Brethren  sing 
Evensong ?  "  he  whisper'd.     **  Brother,  yea." 
**  Let  us  wait  for  that,"  he  said  ;  and  soon 
Sweetly  sounded  up  the  solemn  chant. 
Caedmon  smiled  and  listen'd  ;  when  it  lull^, 
Sidelong'turn'd  to  sleep  his  old  white  head, 
Shut  his  eyes,  and  gave  his  soul  to  God, 
Maker  of  the  World. 

Twelve  hundred  years 
Since  are  past  and  gone,  nor  he  forgot, 
£.arliest  Poet  of  the  English  Race. 


552  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

Rude  and  simple  were  his  days  and  thoughts. 

Wisely  speaketh  no  man,  howso  leam'd, 

Of  the  making  of  this  wondrous  World, 

Save  a  Poet,  with  a  reverent  soul. 

NoTB. — This  alliterative  meter  is  not  at  all  an  imitation,  but  in  some  d^ree  a  remi^ 
niscence  of  the  old  English  poetry. 

William  Allingham,  in  Macmillan's  Magazine.  \ 


BONAPARTE.* 


In  commencing  the  last  of  these  lectures  on  Bonaparte 
naturally  look  back,  survey  what  I  have  done,  and  compare 
with  what  at  the  outset  I  hoped  and  intended  to  do.  You  wl 
remember  that  I  began  by  recognizing  the  impossibility  Q 
treating  so  large  and  full  a  career  with  any  completeness,  ad 
by  inquiring  how  it  might  most  conveniently  be  divided, 
determined  first  to  lighten  the  ship  by  throwing  overboan 
all  those  military  details  which  belong  less  to  the  historial 
than  to  the  professional  specialist;  next  I  pointed  out  tha 
the  career  falls  naturally  into  two  parts  which  are  widely  dif 
ferent  and  easily  separable  from  each  other.  The  line  a 
demarcation  I  drew  at  the  establishment  of  the  Hereditao] 
Empire  in  1804.  On  one  side  of  this  line,  I  remarked,  yoi 
have  Bonaparte,  on  the  other  side  Napoleon.  The  two  naaia 
may  be  taken  to  represent  two  distinct  historical  develoj 
ments.  To  study  Bonaparte  is  in  the  main  to  study  a  probla 
of  internal  French  history.  It  is  to  inquire  how  the  hk^ 
archy,  which  fell  so  disastrously  in  1792,  burying  for  atim 
the  greatness  of  the  Bourbon  name,  was  revived  by  a  yoo^ 
military  adventurer  from  Corsica;  and  how  this  re^on 
monarchy  gave  domestic  tranquillity  and,  at  first,  a  stio^ 
sense  of  happiness,  to  the  French  people,  and  at  the  SM 
time  European  ascendency  to  the  French  State.  Ott-H 
other  hand,  to  study  Napoleon  is  to. study  not  Fresdh,! 

*  The  last  of  a  long  course  of  lectures  [at  Cambridge  Vni   riiiti|-r  lniliMi 
containing  a  condensed  statement  of  results.  ™*^^*^""^J 


BONAPARTE.  T?5" 

European  history ;  it  is  to  inquire  how  the  balance  of  power 
was  overturned,  how  the  federal  system  of  Europe  crumbled 
as  the  throne  of  the  Bourbons  had  done  before,  hoW  a  uni- 
versal monarchy  was  set  up,  and  then  how  he  fell  again  by  a 
sudden  reaction.  Availing  myself  of  this  distinction,  I  pro- 
posed to  investigate  the  first  problem  only;  I  dismissed 
Napoleon  altogether,  and  fixed  my  attention  on  Bonaparte. 

And  now  I  find  without  much  surprise  that  this  problem 
taken  alone  is  too  much  for  me.  I  have  given  you  not  so 
much  a  history  as  the  introduction  to  a  history.  I  break  off  on 
this  side  even  of  the  Revolution  of  Brumaire.  As  to  the  Con- 
sulate,— ^with  its  peculiar  institutions,  its  rich  legislation,  and 
its  rapid  development  into  the  Empire, — I  can  scarcely  claim 
even  to  have  introduced  you  to  it.  I  say  I  am  not  surprised 
at  this,  and  I  shall  be  well  content  if  the  sixteen  lectures  I 
have  delivered  have  thrown  real  light  upon  the  large  outlines 
of  the  subject,  and  have  in  any  way  explained  a  phenomenon 
so  vast,  and  in  the  ordinary  accounts  so  utterly  romantic  and 
inconceivable,  as  the  Napoleonic  monarchy.  For  everything 
here  has  to  be  done  almost  from  the  beginning.  In  other 
departments  the  lecturer  follows  in  the  track  of  countless  in- 
vestigators who  have  raised  and  discussed  already  the  prin- 
cipal questions,  who  have  collected  and  arranged  all  the 
needful  information.  It  is  quite  otherwise  in  these  periods  of 
recent  history,  where  investigation,  properly  speaking,  has 
scarcely  begun  its  work.  I  can  refer  you  to  very  few  satis- 
factory text-books.  Histories  no  doubt  there  are,  full  and 
voluminous  enough,  but  they  are  not  histories  in  the  scien- 
tific sense  of  the  v*ord.  Some  are  only  grandiose  romances. 
Others  are  thoroughly  respectable  and  valuable  in  their  kind, 
but  were  never  intended  for  students;  so  that  even  v/here 
they  are  accurate,  even  where  they  are  not  corrupted  by 
prejudice,  or  carelessness,  or  study  of  effect,  they  throw  little 
Kght  upon  the  problems  which  the  student  finds  most  im- 
portant,   in  such  circumstances  it  is  really  a  considerable 


S 54  THE  LIBRA J^  Y  MAGAZINE, 

t?isk  to  sweep  away  the  purely  popular,  romantic,  and  fan- 
tastic views  of  the  subject  which  prevail,  and  to  bring  out 
clearly  the  exact  questions  which  need  to  be  investigated ; 
as,  indeed,  it  is  true  generally  of  scientific  investigation  that 
the  negative  work  of  destroying  false  views^  and  then  the 
preparatory  work  of  laying  down  the  Imes  of  a  sound  method, 
are  almost  more  important  than  the  positive  work  of  inves- 
tigation itself. 

The  great  problem  I  have  raised  and  examined  has  beeti 
the  connection  of  Bonaparte's  power  with  the  Revolution. 
Let  me  try,  in  quitting  the  subject,  to  sum  up  the  conclusions 
to  which  we  have  been  led.  The  first  is  this,  that  Bonaparte 
does  rrot,  properly  speaking,  come  out  of  the  Revolution,  but 
out  of  the  European  war.  What  is  the  popular  theory  ?  In 
few  words  it  is  this,  that  a  revolutionary  period  is  often  ter- 
minated by  a  military  dictatorship,  as  is  shown  by  the  ex- 
amples of  Caesar,  Cromwell,  and  the  Italian  tyrants  of  the 
fourteenth  century ;  that  the  cause  of  this  is  to  be  sought  in 
the  craving  for  rest,  and  the  general  lassitude  and  disappoint- 
ment which  follow  a  vain  struggle  for  liberty;  and  that  Bona- 
parte's rise  to  power  is  simply  an  example  of  the  working  of 
this  historic  law.  Now,  to  begin  with,  I  should  state  the 
historic  law  itself  somewhat  differently.  It  is  rather  this,  that 
when  from  any  cause  the  government  of  a  state  is  suddenly 
overthrown,  the  greatest  organized  power  which  is  left  in  the 
country  is  tempted  to  take  its  place.  Such,  for  instance,  was 
the  municipality  of  Paris  when  the  French  monarchy  fell  on 
the  loth  of  August.  Accordingly  the  municipality  of  Paris 
seized  the  control  of  affairs  by  a  violent  coup  d'etat.  But  as  ;^ 
general  rule  the  greatest  organized  power  which  is  at  hand 
when  a  government  falls,  is  the  army.  It  is  therefore  natural 
that  as  a  general  rule  a  revolution  should  be  followed  by  a 
usurpation  of  the  army.  And  this  might,  no  doubt,  have  hap- 
pened in  France  as  early  as  1792.  Instead  of  the  ascendency- 
of  the  Jacobins  there  might  have  been  a  tyranny  of  Dtimou** 


BONAPARTE,  SSS 

riez,  but  for  the  accident  that  the  French  army  at  that  moment 
was  undergoing  a  transformation.  i 

But  there  is  also  another  possibility^  A  military  dictator- 
ship, or  the  form  of  government  called  Imperialism,  may  be 
brought  into  existence  by  quite  another  cause,  namely,  by  any 
circumstance  which  may  give  an  abnormal  importance  in  the 
state  to  the  army.  It  is  from  this  cause,  for  instance,  that 
the  monarchy  in  Prussia  has  been  so  military  as  to  be  prac- 
tically an  imperialism.  This  also  is  the  true  explanation  of 
the  rise  of  imperialism  in  ancient  Rome.  Not  the  mere  las- 
situde of  parties  at  Rome,  but  the  necessity  of  a  centralized 
military  power  to  hold  together  the  vast  empire  of  Rome 
which  military  force  had  created — ^this  was  the  real  ground  of 
the  power  of  the  Caesars.  Now,  in  explaining  the  rise  of 
Bonaparte,  I  think  that  too  much  is  made  of  the  cause  form- 
erly mentioned,  and  infinitely  too  little  of  this.  It  is  no  doubt 
-  true  that  the  lassitude  of  the  French  mind  in  1799  was  great, 
and  that  the  people  felt  a  sensible  relief  in  committing  their 
affairs  to  the  strong  hand  of  Bonaparte ;  but  I  do  not  think 
that  this  lassitude  was  more  than  a  very  secondary  cause  of 
his  rise  to  power.  It  is  true  also  that  in  1799  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  Directory  had  sunk  into  such  contempt,  that  it 
might  be  regarded  as  at  an  end,  so  that  it  was  open  to  an  or- 
ganized power  like  the  army,  to  take  its  place  by  a  sudden 
coup  d'etat.  But  this  cause  too  is  as  nothing,  and  might 
almost  be  left  out  of  the  account,  con^pared  with  another, 
which  in  the  popular  theory  is  wholly  overlooked  and  neg- 
C^ed. 

I  trace  the  rise  of  Bonaparte's  imperialism  to  the  levee  en 
nasse,  and  to  the  enormous  importance  which  was  given  to 
tire  army  and  to  military  affairs  generally  by  a  war  of  far 
g^reater  magnitude  than  France  had  ever  been  engaged  in  be- 
fore. No  doubt  there  were  many  secondary  causes,  but  the 
point  on  which  I  insist  is  that  they  were  entirely  secondary, 
and  that  this  cause  alone  is  primary.     You  will  not  find  by 


5  5^  Tl^E  LIBRAE  V  MA GAZINE, 

studying  the  Revolution  itself  any  sufficient  explanation  of 
Bonaparte's  power.  Bonaparte  did  not  rise  directly  out  of 
the  revolution,  but  out  of  the  war.  Indirectly  as  the  revolu- 
tion caused  the  war,  it  may  be  said  to  have  caused  the  rise  of 
Bonaparte,  but  a  war  of  the  same  magnitude,  if  there  had  been 
no  revolution,  would  have  caused  a  similar  growth  of  impe- 
rialism. If  under  the  old  regime  France  had  had  to  put  into 
the  field  fourteen  armies  and  to  maintain  this  military  effort 
for  several  years,  the  old  monarchy  itself  would  have  been 
transformed  into  an  imperialism.  That  imperialism  appeared 
now  in  such  a  naked,  undisguised  form,  was  the  necessary  ef- 
fect of  this  unprecedented  war  occurring  at  the  moment  when 
France  was  without  an  established  government.  The  circum- 
stances of  the  Revolution  itself,  the  Reign  of  Terror,  the  fall 
of  Robespierre,  the  establishment  of  the  Directory,  all  these 
things  made  little  difference.  Bonaparte's  empire  was  the 
result  of  two  large,  simple  causes — the  existence  of  a  mighty 
war,  and  at  the  same  time  the  absence  of  an  established  gov- 
ernment. 

As  the  war.  alone  created  the  power,  so  it  alone  determined 
its  character.  Bonaparte  was  driven  by  his  position  into  a 
series  of  wars,  because  nothing  but  war  could  justify  his  au- 
thority. His  rule  was  based  on  a  condition  of  public  danger, 
and  he  was  obliged,  unless  he  would  abdicate,  to  provide  a 
condition  of  danger  for  the  country.  Why  he  was  so  success- 
ful in  his  wars,  and  made  conquests  unprecedented  in  mod- 
ern history,  is  a  question  which  I  have  not  had  occasion  to 
discuss  thoroughly.  But  I  remarked  that  imperialism  in  its 
first  fresh  youth  is  almost  necessarily  successful  in  war.  for 
imperialism  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  the  form  a  state  as- 
sumes when  it  postpones  every  other  object  to  military  effi- 
ciency. 

The  second  great  fact  about  Bonaparte's  connection  witK 
the  Revolution  is  that  he  overthrew  Jacobinism.  From  this 
fact  too  it  may  be  perceived  that  he  was  the  child,  not  of  the 


k 


BONAPARTE,  557 

Parisian  Revolution,  but  of  the  levee  en  masse.  Bonaparte 
canceled  Jacobinism  j  he  destroyed  its  influence  and  perse- 
cuted it  with  unscrupulous  violence.  He  placed  himself  at 
the  head  of  the  reaction  against  it^  He  restored  with  no  little 
success  the  dominion  of  the  old  monarchical  and  ecclesiasti- 
cal ideas.  But  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  define  how  far 
this  reaction  extended.  It  was  not  properly  a  reaction  from 
liberalism,  but  only  from  Jacobinism.  It  was  not  a  reaction 
from  the  French  Revolution  of  1789,  but  from  the  Parisian 
Revolution  of  1792,  For  there  were  two  Revolutions,  widely 
different ;  and,  to  my  mind,  he  who  does  not  understand  this 
will  never  understand  anything  in  the  modern  history  of 
France.  The  struggle  in  modern  France  is  not  between  the 
spirit  of  the  old  regime  and  that  of  the  Revolution  ;  this  is 
wholly  erroneous.  It  is  a  struggle  between  the  principles  of 
1789  and  those  of  1792,  in  other  words,  between  the  principles 
of  European  Liberalism,  and  a  fatal  political  heresy.  The 
monarchy  of  the  Bourbons  was  itself  liberal  for  the  most  part 
throughout  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI.;  it  was  liberal  again  in 
the  constitution  of  1779;  liberal  under  the  Charter  of  Louis 
XVIII.  Since  its  second  fall  in  1830  the  principles  of  1789' 
have  been  represented  in  various  ways  by  Louis  Philippe, 
Louis  Napoleon,  and  the  present  Republic.  There  have  been 
two  great  aberrations  towards  the  heresy  of  1792— namely,  in 
1848  and  in  the  Parisian  insurrection  of  1871 ;  and  in  1830  an 
apprehension  of  the  revival  of  those  ideas  drovQ  the  Govern- 
ment of  Charles  X.  into  measures  which  looked  like  a  revival 
of  the  old  regime. 

The  struggle  then  throughout  has  been  to  kfeepto  the  lines 
of  1789,  and  not  to  be  led  again  into  the  abyss  of  1792.  All 
serious  governments  alike,  that  of  Bonaparte,  that  of  the  Res- 
toration, that  of  Louis  Philippe,  that  of  Louis  Napoleon  and 
the  present  opportunist  Republic,  have  adhered  to  the  princi- 
ples of  1789 — ^the  old  regime  has  been  utterly  dead,  and  even 
Charles  X.  did  not  seriously  dream  of  reviving  it — ^and  the 


55^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

only  difference  among  them  has  lain  in  the  mode  of  their  re- 
sistence  to  the  ideas  of  1792.  How  to  gi'ard  against  the  revi- 
val of  those  insane  chimeras,  against  a  new  outbreak  of  that 
fanaticism  in  which  phrases  half  philosophical  half  poetical 
intoxicate  undisciplined  minds  and  excite  to  madness  the 
nervous  excitable  vanity  of  the  city  of  Paris,  this  has  been 
the  one  question;  1792  has,  been  the  one  enemy.  The  Res- 
toration and  Louis  Philippe  tried  to  carry  on  pariiamentary 
government  in  the  face  of  this  danger — but  in  vain ;  1792  re- 
vived in  1848.  The  two  Napoleons  tried  another  method,  a 
Liberal  Absolutism,  in  which  the  principles  of  1789  were 
placed  under  the  guardianship  of  a  dictator,  and  the  method 
was  successful  at  home,  but  in  foreign  affairs  it  was  found  to 
lead  to  such  ambitious  aggressiveness  that  in  both  cases  it 
brought  on  the  invasion  and  conquest  of  France. 

When,  therefore,  I  say  that  Bonaparte  put  himself  at  the 
head  of  the  reaction  and  revived  the  old  monarchical  and  ec- 
clesiastical ideas,  I  do  not  mean  that  he  exploded  the  ideas  of 
1789,  but  those  of  1792.  Belonging  to  the  France  of  the  levee 
en  masse,  which  had  appeared  to  be  Jacobinical  only  because 
the  invasion  had  driven  it  into  the  arms  of  the  Jacobins,  he 
quietly  put  aside  the  whole  system  of  false  and  confused 
thinking  which  had  reigned  since  1792,  and  which  he  called 
ideology.  He  went  back  to  the  system  which  had  preceded 
it,  and  this  was  the  system  of  1789.  It  stood  on  a  wholly 
different  footing  from  Jacobinism,  because  it  really  was  the 
political  creed  of  almost  the  whole  nation^.  It  was  what  I  may 
call  Eighteenth-Century  Liberalism.  And  in  the  first  part  of 
his  reign,  in  the  Consulate  and  even  later,  Bonaparte  did 
stand  out  before  Europe  as  the  great  representative  of  liberal 
principles,  and  none  the  less  so  because  he  had  abjured  and 
was  persecuting  Jacobinism.  **  But  what  ?  '*  you  will  say, 
"  how  could  Bonaparte  represent  Liberalism,  when  he  had 
himself  put  aside  all  parliamentary  institution ;  ,when  his  own 
Senate  and  Corps  Legislatif  were,  in  the    first    place,  not 


BONAPARTE.  559 

representative  at  all ;  and  in  the  second  place  were  in  every 
possible  way  baffled  and  insulted  by  him  ?  "  The  answer  is 
that  Liberalism,  as  it  was  conceived  in  Europe  in  the  eight- 
eenth century,  had  very  little  to  do  with  liberty,  and  that  the 
leading  representatives  of  it  were  generally  absolute  sover- 
eigns. The  great  founders  of  Liberalism  in  Europe  were  such 
men  as  Frederick  the  Great,  the  Emperor  Joseph,  Charles  IIL 
of  Spain,  or  ministers  of  absolute  sovereigns,  such  as  Turgot 
and  Necker,  It  was  in  this  succession  that  Bonaparte  had 
his  place,  and  from  many  utterances  of  his  X  gather  that  he 
regarded  htHtself  as  the  direct  successor  in  Europe  of  Freder- 
ick the  Great.  Most  of  these  sovereigns  had  not  only  been 
absolute,  but  had  been  active  enemies  of  government  by  As- 
sembly. Their  Liberalism  had  consisted  in  their  jealousy  of 
the  Church,  their  earnest  desire  for  improvement,  and  a  kind 
of  rationalism  or  plain  good  sense  in  promoting  it.  In  their 
measures  they  are  particularly  arbitrary ;  and  if  Bonaparte 
made  the  coup  d'etat  of  Brumaire,  we  may  say  of  the  Emperor 
Joseph,  the  great  representative  of  Liberalism,  that  his  ad- 
ministration was  one  long  coup  d'etat.  If  Bonaparte's  reign 
seems  in  one  point  of  view  like  a  revival  of  the  old  regime,  it 
is  the  old  regime  in  its  last  phase,  when  it  was  penetrated 
with  the  ideas  which  were  to  be  formulated  in  1789,  and  when 
Turgfot  and  Necker  were  its  ministers.  If  Bonaparte  ruled 
practically  without  assemblies,  we  are  to  remember  that  in 
1789  itself,  when  the  States-General  were  summoned,  there  is 
no  reason  to  think  it  was  intended  to  create  a  standing  Par- 
liament, and  Mirabeau  held  that  they  ought  to  be  dismissed 
immediately  after  having  voted  the  abolition  of  the  exemp- 
tions of  the  noblesse  and  clergy. 

Such  then  are  my  conclusions  about  Bonaparte's  relation  to 
the  French  Revolution.  But  Bonaparte  belongs  to  Ekirope 
as  well  as  France,  and  in  Europe  he  represents  a  new  princi- 
ple, that  of  conquest.  I  have  considered  him  in  this  light 
also,  and  have  pointed  gut  that  here  too  large  causes  had  be^n. 


560  THE  LIBRAR  V  MA GAZINE. 

wor4cing  to  prepare  the  way  for  him.  In  the  system  of  Eu- 
rope, in  fact,  there  had  been  a  revolution  not  less  than  in  the 
internal  government  of  France.  The  great  event  of  this  Eu- 
,ropean  Revolution  had  been  the  partition  of  Poland.  This 
was  a  proclamation  of  international  lawlessness,  of  the  end  of 
the  old  federal  system  of  Europe,  and  of  the  commencement 
of  a  sort  of  scramble  for  territory  among  the  great  states. 
And  it  ought  particularly  to  be  remarked  that  the  leaders  in 
this  international  revolution  were  precisely  the  great  liberal 
sovereigns  of  the  age,  Frederick,  Catharine,  and  Joseph.  So 
long  as  sovereigns  of  tolerably  equal  power  arranged  such  ap- 
propriations artiong  themselves  it  might  be  done  without 
causing  a  general  confusion  ;  but  the  moment  some  one 
power  greatly  outstripped  all  others  in  military  strength  the 
policy  of  the  partition  of  Poland  would  turn  into  a  universal 
conquest.  Now  this  immense  superiority  was  given  to  Fiance 
by  her  levee  en  masse.  When  she  placed  a  new  Frederick  at 
her  head  it  was  only  natural  that  she  should  take  the  lead  in 
a  more  general  application  of  the  principle  of  the  partition  of 
Poland,  and  none  the  less  because  she  became  at  the  same 
time  the  representative  of  Liberalism  in  Europe.  By  the 
treaty  of  Campo  Formio,  France,  under  the  leadership  of 
Bonaparte,  inaugurated  the  policy  of  universal  partition  and 
spoliation  of  the  small  states  of  Europe,  which  in  a  short  time 
led  to  the  Napoleonic  Empire. 

So  far  Bonaparte  has  been  to  us  simply  a  name  for  the 
government  of  France,  such  as  the  almost  irresistible  pres- 
sure of  circumstances  caused  it  to  be.  Given  the  changes  of 
1789  and  the  fall  of  the  monarchy  in  1792,  given  at  the  same 
time  the  European  war,  an  all-powerful  military  government 
could  not  but  arise  in  France,  could  not  but  adopt  a  warlike 
policy,  and  in  the  then  condition  of  international  morality, 
and  considering  the  aggressive  traditions  of  the  French, 
would  probably,  whether  it  were  directe4  by  Bonaparte, 
Moreau,  or  Massena,  embark  in  a  career  of  conquest.    But  I 


BONAPARTE,  .     ■  W. 

have  also  made  some  inquiry  in  these  lectures  into  the  pet 
soniil  character  of  Bonaparte.  In  doing  so,  I  have  bee: 
forced  to  raise  the  general  question,  at  once  so  interestin 
and  so  bewildering  to  the  historical  student,  of  the  persons 
influence  of  great  men.  \ 

My  desire  is  to  see  this  question,  like  other  historical  quej 
tions,  treated  inductively  and  without  ungrounded  assumi 
tions.    Great  men  have  been  so  long  a  favorite  declamati 
that  we  can  scarcely  treat  them  coolly,  or  avoid  being  misl^ 
by  one  or  other  of  the  exaggerated  notions  and  bombast 
conceits  that  have  been  put  in  currency  about  them.     For 
long  time  it  was  a  commonplace  to  describe  such  persons  . 
Bonaparte  as  a  sort  of  madmen,  who  amused  themselves  wi 
devastatingljie  earth  purely  for  their  own  selfish  gratific 
tion.    Th^^ord  was — 

Heroes  are  much  the  same,  the  point's  agreed, 
From  Macedoaia's  madman  to  the  Swede. 

But  in  this  generation  the  very  opposite  view  has  haa  mc 
acceptance ;  heroes  have  been  made  into  objects  of  worsb 
a  fact  of  which  you  have  been  reminded  since  I  began  th( 
lectures  by  the  departure  from  among  us  of  the  celeb ra 
founder  of  the  cultus.    Half  a  century  has  passed  since  3 
Carlyle  issued  his  first  eloquent  protests  against  what 
called  the  mean  materialist  view  that  great  men  are  m 
charlatans,  deceivers   or  impostors  who  have  hoodwinl 
mankind.    According  to  him  the  fact  is  quite  otherwise  ;  tl 
are  the  commissioned  guides  of  mankind,  who  rule  their 
lows  because  they  are  wiser ;  and  it  is  only  by  such  guida 
that  man's  life  is  made  endurable  ;  and  almost  all  virtue  c 
sists  in  the  loyal  fidelity  of  each  man  to  the  hero  who  is  s 
ereign  by  a  divine  election.     Certainly  this  was  a   m- 
more  generous,  more  ennobling  creed  than  the  other,  ar 
think  it  is  also,  in  general,  a  truer  one.    If  I  criticise  it,  1 
so  only  because  fifty  years  have  now  passed  over  it,  an 
seems  to  me  that  the  study  of  history  has  entered  upon  a 


5^2  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

st3ge.     In  those  days  history  was  regarded  much  in  the  same 

way  as  poetry  ;  it  was  a  liberal  pursuit  in  which  men  found 

wholesome   food   for  the   imagination   and  the  sympathies. 

Mr,  Ciirtyic  gave  good  counsel  when  he  said  that  we  should 

bring^  to  it  an  earnest  and  reverent  rather  than  a  cynical  spirit. 

But  histor}^  is  now  a  department  of  serious  scientific  investi- 

:^ation.     We  study  history  now  in  the  hope  of  giving  new  pre- 

rision,  definiteness,  and  solidity  to  the  principles  of  political 

icience.    We  endeavor  therefore  to  approach  it  in  the  pro- 

>er  scientific  temper,  and  this  is  not  quite  the  same,  though 

t  is  by  no  means  altogether  different,  from  the  temper  recora- 

nended  by  Mn  Carlyle.     It  is  a  temper  disposed  to  shrink 

rom  every  kind  of  foregone  conclusion,  a  temper  of  pure  im- 

►artiality  and  candor.     Such  a  temper  will  l^just  as  little 

atisfied  with  Mr,  Carlyle's  theory  of  great  ni^ii  ^.s  with  the 

Id  theory  \  it  will  fefrain  from  committing  itself  to  any  a 

riori  theor)^  on  the  subject.    It  will  study  history,  not  in  or- 

er  to  prove  that  great  men  are  this  or  that  they  are  that,  but 

J  order  to  lind  out  what  they  are.     Starting  from  the  simple. 

tct  that  occasionally  individual  men,  who  may  at  first  sight 

ppear  not  very  greatly  to  surpass  their  fellows,  acquire 

1  unbounded  influence  over  them,  so  that  whole  nations 

:em  to  lose  themselves  and  be  swallowed  up  in  their  sov- 

'eign  personality,  we  do  not  dream  that  we  can  discover  by 

>me  intuition  how  this  happens,  we  do  not  imagine  that  it  is 

>ble  to  take  for  granted  that  it  happens  in  a  certain  way, or 

tsc  and  cynical  torcgard  it  as  happening  in  another  way.    We 

mpiy  want  to  know  how  it  does  happen,  and  for  this  pur. 

jse  we  examine  history  in  a  spirit  of  pure,  unprejudiced 

iriosity. 

Few  characters  are  so  well  adapted  for  testing  the  theory 
heroes  as  Bonaparte.  His  name  occurs  to  us  almost  before 
y  other  when  we  want  examples  of  the  power  of  a  person- 
ty.  If  we  wanted  to  show  how  mankind  naturally  desire  a 
ider,  bow  they  instinctively  detect  the  born  hero,  how  gladly 


BONAPARTE,  563 

and  loyally  they  obey  him,  what  example  but  Bonaparte 
should  we  quote  ?  Where  shall  we  find  anything  similar  to 
his  return  from  Elba,  which  seemed  to  realize  the  never- 
realized  i^eturn  of  Arthur  from  fairyland ;  or,  again,  to  the 
sudden  revival  of  his  family  thirty  years  after  his  death,  when 
the  mere  name  Napoleon  carried  his  nephew  to  supreme 
-  power  ?  How  much  more  striking  than  anything  which  can 
be  produced  Irom  the  life  of  Mr.  Carlyle's  favorite  Cromwell, 
who  does  not  seem  ever  to  have  been  popular,  and  who  left 
no  very  vivid  memory  behind  him  !  And  yet  Mr.  Carlyle  is 
strangely  shy  of  Bonaparte.  He  avoids  that  wonderful  tale, 
which  it  might  f  eem  that  he  above  all  men  was  called  upon 
to  write.  Ocii^Slonally,  indeed,  as  if  to  keep  up  the  credit  of 
the  theory,  he  includes  Bonaparte  as  a  matter  of  course  among 
his  divine  heroes,  coiigratulating  that  age,  for  instance,  upon 
its  two  great  men,  Napoleon  and  Goethe — nay,  actually  put- 
ting Napoleon  by  the  side  of  Cromwell  in  his  lecture  on  "  The 
Hero  as  King."  But  more  commonly  he  carpsmnd  grumbles 
at  this  enormous  reputation ;  and  the  short,  perfunctory  ac- 
count of  him  given  in  the  lecture  I  have  just  mentioned  is 
nothing  less,  if  you  will  look  at  it  closely,  than  a  helpless 
abandonment  of  the  whole  theory  which  the  book  professes 
to  expound.  It  acknowledges,  almost  in  expi*ess  words,  that 
the  old  cynical  theory  of  heroes  may  in  some  cases,  after  all, 
bT  "true,  and  that  in  Napoleon  to  a  good  extent  it  is  true. 

In  these  lectures*  I  have  tried,  by  investigating  the  facts 
themselves,  to  discover  the  secret  of  Bonaparte's  immense 
influence.  I  began  with  no  preconception,  with  not  the  small- 
est desire  to  prove  or  disprove  either  that  he  was  a  hero  or  a 
charlatan,  and  quite  prepared  to  believe  that  he  might  be 
neither  the  one  nor  the  other,  and  that  his  success  might  be 
due  to  causes  not  personal  at  all.  I  was  also  quite  prepared, 
if  necessary,  to  leave  the  question  unsolved,  confessing,  if  I 
found  it  so,  that  the  evidence  was  insufficient  to  support  ? 
solid  conclusion.    For  here  is  another  wide  difference  betweer 


564  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.  \n^ 

our  present  view  of  history  and  that  taken  by  the  last  gener- 
ation. They,  as  they  valued  history  for  the  emotions  it  excited, 
estimated  an  historian  by  the  grandeur  and  gorgeousness  of 
the  pictures  he  drew.  It  was  thus  that  he  was  supposed  to 
prove  his  genius.  His  function  was  supposed  to  be  identical 
with  that  of  the  dramatist  or  novelist ;  he  was  supposed  to 
animate  the  dry  bones  of  historical  documents  by  the  same 
imaginative  knowledge  of  human  nature  by  ;which  a  Shake- 
speare creates  his  characters.  But  the  modern  investigator, 
if  he  uses  such  a  gift  at  all,  is  most  anxiously  careful  not  tombc 
up  divinations  or  flashes  of  intuition  with  clear  deductions 
from  solid  evidence.  He  thinks  it  a  kind  of  fraud  to  announce 
what  he  fancies  may  have  happened,  without  the  fullest  warn- 
ing, for  what  ^/</ happen;  he  even  distrusts  whatever  presents 
itself  as  poetical  or  picturesque,  and  is  content  to  acknowledge, 
if  it  must  be  so— and  often  it  must  be  so — ^that  only  a  vague, 
confused,  blurred,  and  imperfect  representation  of  the  occur- 
rence or  the  person  can  now  be  given. 

In  this  spirit,  then,  I  have  cautiously  examined  the  charaC 
ter  of  Bonaparte  as  it  developed  itself  in  his  earlier  years.     If 
I  have  not  found  the  Carlylean  theory  of  heroes  applicable 
in  this  instance,  I  am  far  from  concluding  that  it  is  nevof 
applicable.    That  theory  would  lead  uj^-to  assume  that  Bqna* 
parte  had  deeper  and  more  intense  conviction's  than  the  <^^hcr' 
men  of  his  time,  and  that  because,  while  others  wanted:  iar* 
ness  of  insight  or  firmness  of  will,  he  alone  saw  what  FrjOi^ 
and  the  world  needed  and  had  strength  and  courage  to  apply 
the  true  remedy,  therefore  all  mankind  gladly  rallied  roun4 
him,  cheerfully  and  loyally  obeye^  him  as  being  the  stronger; 
wiser,  and,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word,  better  man.     J^toWf 
it  may  be  true  that  other  great  men  have  risen  so ;  I  lay  d<m 
no  general  theory  of  great  men ;  but  Bonaparte  did  npf^^*^ 
in  this  way.  ^^  j| 

In  the  first  place  I  have  pointed  out  that  of  the  vast 
of  his  greatness  more  than  half  was  not  built  Iqr  hto 


BONAPARTE,  565 

'  but  for  him.  He  entered  into  a  house  which  he  found  ready- 
made.  He  neither  created  the  imperial  system  in  France,  nor 
did  he  inaugurate  the  ascendency  of  France  in  Europe,  Both 
grew  up  naturally  out  of  large  causes  from  the  time  of  the 
levee  en  masse ;  both  were  considerably  developed  under  the 
direction  of  Camot ;  at  the  time  of  Bonaparte's  brilliant  ap- 
pearance in  Italy  the  general  course  of  development  for 
France  was  already  determined.  She  was  on  her  way  to  a 
period  of  military  government  and  of  military  policy  likely  to 
lead  to  great  conquests.  If  Bonaparte  had  not  appeared,  to 
take  the  lead  in  this  movement  and  give  his  name  to  the 
period,  some  other  military  man  would  have  accomplished  a 
work  which  in  its  large  outlines  would  have  been  the  same. 
It  is  a  mistake  therefore  to  regard  him  as  a  great  creative 
mind.  The  system  which  bears  his  name  was  not  created  by 
him,  but  forced  upon  him,  for  all  the  large  outlines  of  the 
Napoleonic  system  can  be  clearly  traced  under  the  Directory, 
and  at  a  time  when  his  influence  was  only  just  beginning  to 
be  felt. 

In  showing  that  he  did  not  quell  mankind  by  irresistible 
heroism,  I  show  at  the  same  time  that  he  did  not  rise  to 
^upreme  power  by  charlatanry.  In  fact  he  floated  to  supreme 
power  upon  a  tide  of  imperialism  which  he  did  not  create,  and 
which  must,  sooner  or  later,  have  placed  a  soldier  at  the  head 
of  affairs.  In  this  matter  all  he  needed  to  do  was  to  take  care 
that  Europe  did  not  make  peace,  for  in  peace  the  tide  of  imper- 
ialism would  soon  have  ebbed  again.  And  we  have  seen  him 
at  this  work  during  the  first  months  of  1798,  when,  appar- 
ently by  his  agency,  the  war  burst  suddenly  into  a  flame  when 
it  was  on  the  point  of  being  extinguished.  But,  this  point 
once  secured,  "  his  strength  was  to  sit  still  "  ;  his  wisdom  lay 
in  doing  nothing,  in  simply  absenting  himself  by  his  Eastern 
expedition  from  the  scene  of  action. 

But  though  his  own  share  in  creating  the  fabric  of  his 
greatness  was  perhaps  less  than  half,  it  was  positively  large. 


566  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Had  there  been  no  Bonaparte,  a  Moreau  or  a  Massena  might 
have  risen  to  a  position  not  dissimilar,  might  have  wielded  a 
vast  imperial  [>ower  extending  from  France  far  into  Germany 
and  Italy;  but  assuredly  they  would  not  have  borne  them- 
selves in  that  position  as  Bonaparte  did,  nor  left  the  same 
indelible  impression  upon  history.  What  then  were  the  purely 
personal  qualities  which  he  displayed  ? 

In  the  first  place  he  showed  a  mind  capable  of  embradng 
affairs  of  every  sort  and  in  no  way  limited  by  his  own  specialty. 
This,  conjoined  with  a  real  and  by  no  means  vulgar  passion 
for  fame,  a  passion  which  stood  to  him  in  the  place  of  all  virtue 
and  all  morality,  gave  to  his  reign  one  truly  splendid  side.  It 
made  him  the  great  founder  of  the  modern  institutions  of 
France.  Not  merely  the  Code,  but  a  number  of  great  insti- 
tutions, almost  indeed  the  whole  organization  of  modern 
France,  administration,  university,  concordat,  bank,  judicial 
and  military  systems  are  due  to  him.  He  saved  France  from 
the  ruin  with  which  she  was  threatened  by  Jacobinism,  which 
in  the  four  years  of  its  definitive  establishment  (1795 — 1799) 
proved  utterly  unable  to  replace  the  institutions  it  had  so 
recklessly  destroyed.  Jacobinism  could  only  destroy;  the 
queller  of  Jacobinism,  the  absolute  sovereign,  the  reactionist* 
Bonapartet'%uccessfully  rebuilt  the  French  state. 

The  simple  explanation  of  this  is  that  his  Government  was  a 
real  Government,  the  first  that  had  been  established  since  the 
destruction  of  ancient  France  in  the  Revolution.  It  could 
not,  therefore,  help  undertaking,  and — as  it  w^^areal  Govern- 
ment, and  no  m  ere  party  tyranny — it  met  with  no  great  diffi- 
culty in  accomplishing  an  immense  work  of  legislation.  But 
an  ordinary  child  of  camps  would  not  by  any  means  have  risen 
to  the  greatness  of  the  position  as  Bonaparte  did ;  his  early 
admiration  and  study  of  Paoli,  I  fancy,  had  prepared  him  for 
this  part  of  dictatorial  legislator,  while  Rousseau  had. filled 
him  with  ideas  of  the  dignity  of  the  office.  I  have  thought  I 
could  trace  to  Rousseau's  idea  that  the  work  of  legislation 


BONAPARTE,  56/ 

requires  a  divine  sanction,  Bonaparte's  revival  of  the  medieval 
empire  and  his  solemn  iijtroduction  of  the  Pope  upon  the 
sbene. 

Bat  this  unexpected  largeness  of  Bonaparte's  mind,  which 
^  caused  him  to  fill  so  amply,  and  more  than  fill,  the  imperial 
place  which  he  had  not  really  created,  had  beside  this  good 
effect  a  terribly  bad  one.  A  Moreau  or  Bernadotte  in  that 
position  must  have  been  the  strongest  sovereign  in  Europe, 
and  something  of  a  conqueror,  nor  could  he  well  have  avoided 
perpetual  wars.  But  Bonaparte  had  added  to  the  more  ordin- 
ary qualities  of  a  great  general  a  comprehensive  strategical 
talent  and  war-statesmanship,  which  till  then  had  seldom  been 
seen  in  great  generals.  He  seems  to  have  learned  the  secret 
frOm  Carnot,  and  from  watphing  with  intense  eagerness  the 
course  of  the  first  campaigns  of  the  revolutionary  war.  Pos- 
sessing this  talent,  when  he  found  himself  at  the  head  of  the 
mighty  military  state  which  had  sprung  out  of  the  levee  en 
masse,  he  not  only  appeared,  as  he  could  not  but  do,  the  most 
powerful  sovereign  in  Europe,  but  he  actually  overthrew  the 
European  system  and  founded  something  like  an  empire  on 
the  ruins  of  it.  Hence  the  terrible  and  disastrous  Napoleonic 
period  with  all  its  unprecedented  bloodshed  and  ruin,  which, 
however,  I,  concerned  with  Bonaparte  and  not  with  Napoleon, 
have  only  exhibited  in  the  background. 

Still,  however,  we  are  far  from  penetrating  to  the  person- 
ality of  Bonaparte.  What  we  have  hitherto  found  would 
incline  us  to  reject  both  those  theories  of  great  men  alike, 
and  to  say — "  Great  men  are  neither  demigods  nor  yet  charla- 
tans. They  do  not  act  but  are  acted  on ;  they  are  hurried 
forward  by  vast  forces  of  which  they  can  but  slightly  modify 
the  direction."  What  glimpses  we  did  get  of  Bonaparte's 
real  mind  were  derived  less  from  his  deeds  than  from  those 
plans  of  his  which  failed.  We  examined  first  and  rejected 
those  views  of  him  which  represent  him  as  gradually  spoiled 
or  corrupted  in  the  course  of  his  career  either  by  success  or 


568      '.  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

by  disappointment.  There  are  two  such  views.  The  one 
regards  him  as  a  fiery  Corsican  patriot  of  the  type  of  Sam- 
piero,  revenging  himself  upon  France  and  Europe  for  the  loss 
of  his  country ;  the  other  treats  him  as  a  republican  hero  and 
invincible  soldier  6f  liberty  who  yielded  after  a  time  to  ambi- 
tion and  wandered  from  the  right  course.  These  two  views 
agree  in  regarding  him  as  a  man  of  intense  passions,  what 
may  be  called  a  primitive  man. 

I  have  given  reasons  for  treating  this  appearance  of  prim- 
itive heroism  in  Bonaparte  as  a  theatrical  pose,  deliberately 
assumed  by  him  in  order  to  gratify  the  rage  for  primitive  nature 
which  Rousseau  had  introduced,  and  which  was  at  its  acme 
under  the  Directory.    Behind  the  mask  I  have  found  a  remark- 
able absence  of  passions  except  an  almost  maniacal  passion 
for  advancement  and  fame.    The  character  indeed  is  not  Cor- 
sican so  much  as  Oriental.     He  is  not  vindictive  as  a  Corsican 
should.be;  he  is  not  patriotic,  but  deserts  his  country  most 
unnecessarily ;  he  seems  to  care  for  no  opinion,  though  he 
adopts  with  much  studied  artificial  vehemence  every  fashion- 
able opinion  in  turn.     His  early  plans,  which  can  be  pretty 
plainly  discerned  from  the  commencement  of  his  Italian  cam- 
paigns, are  precisely  similar  to  those  afterwards  formed  by 
the  Emperor  Napoleon.     From  the  beginning  they  are  plans 
of  lawless  conquest  on  the  model  of  the  partition  of  Poland* 
plans  in  which  the  revolutionary  doctrine  is  used  with  pecu- 
liar skill  as^n  instrument  of  attack  and  conquest.     His  im- 
morality and  cynicisni  are  more  apparent  even  on  the  surface 
of  his  deeds  in  his  earlier  than  in  his  later  years,  while  there 
are  appearances  of  a  vast  plot  contrived  by  him  against  the 
Directory,*  which  might  fairly  be  called  the  unapproachable 
masterpiece   of  human  wickedness^     But  what  throws    the 
clearest  light  upon  his  character  is  that  darling  plan  of  his,  the 
failure  of  which  he  never  ceased  to  regret,  the  Eastern  expe- 


*  See  Arthur  Bohtlingk*s  Napoleoa  Bonaparte,  vol.  ii. 


BONAPARTE.  569 

dition.  What  he  did  in  Europe  tells  us  little  of  his  character, 
compared  to  what  he  dreamed  of  doing  in  Asia.  He  had  never 
meant  to  be  Caesar  or  Charlemagne;  these  were  but  parts  to 
which  he  sullenly  resigned  himself.  He  had  meant  to  be  Al- 
exander the  Great,  only  on  a  much  larger  scale.  His  real 
career  is  but  a  shabby  adaptation  of  the  materials  he  had  col- 
lected in  vain  for  his  darling  Asiatic  romance.  It  was  some- 
thing, perhaps,  to  restore  the  Pope  and  the  French  Church,  to 
negotiate  the  concordat  and  re-enact  the  crowning  of  Charles, 
but  it  was  little  compared  to  what  he  had  imagined.  He  had 
imagined  a  grand  religious  and  political  revolution,  beginning- 
in  the  east  and  extending  westward,  some^ fusion  apparently  of 
,  Rousseau's  deism  with  the  Allah-ism  of  Mohammed,  a  relig- 
ious revolution  extending  over  the  whole  East  and  then  com- 
bined in  some  way  with  the  revolution  of  France,  when  the 
great  Prophet-King  should  return  to  the  ^Vest  by  way  oj 
Constantinople. 

But  what  does  this  romance  tell  us  of  the  character  of  him 
who  conceived  it  ?  And  how  does  this  character  square  with 
those  a  priori  theories  of  what  great  men  should  be  ? 

I  must  say,  it  squares  rather  remarkably  with  the  old  tbeor} 
which  Mr.  Carlyle  drove  out  of  fashion.     Here  is  really  a  great 
deceiver,  a  man  who  revels  in  the  thought  of  governing  man. 
kind  through  their  credulity;  who,  brought  up   in  Europe 
has,  as  it  were,  rediscovered  for  himself  the  wxS.  of  the  grea 
prophet-conquerors  of  Asia — it  is  curious  that  among  the  lit 
erary  pieces  left  by  Bonaparte  is  a  version  of   the  famou: 
story  of  the  "  Veiled  Prophet  of  Khorassan  "—only  in  thosi 
prophet-conquerors  there  was  probably  always  some  grain  o 
conviction  or  self-deception,  and  in  Bonaparte  there  is  noth 
ing  of  the  kind. 
But  might  he  not  be  partly  a  charlatan  and  yet  partly 
j   hero?    A  hero  in  a  certain  sense  certainly  Bonaparte  wa^ 
t   that  is,  a  prodigy  of  will,  activity  and  force.     But  was  he  i 
{  any  degree  a  hero  in  Mr.  Carlyle's  sense  ?    Mr,  Carlyle  i 


56 

by  57^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

re: 

pj,  moralist  and  seems  almost  unable  to  conceive  an  able  man 

^r  entirely  without  morality.    According  to  him  the  very  crimes 

.  of  a  great  man  are  at  bottom  virtuous  acts,  for  they  are  fn- 


-  •     spired  by  a  moral  instinct  taking  as  it  were  a  strange  originai 

form.    But  I  fancy  human  nature  is  wider  than  this  theory. 

Wickedness,  I  fear,  is  not  always  weakness.    There  really  is  a 

human  type,  in  which  vast  intelligence  is  found  dissociated 

. , .   from  virtue.    Nay,  what  is  stranger  -  still,  this  kind  of  hero, 

whose  very  existence  seems  to  Mr.  Carlyie  inconceivable, 

may  exert  an  irresistible  attraction  upon  his  fellow-men,  may 

be  served  with  passionate  loyalty,  and-  may  arouse  in  others 

.    noble  sentiments  of  which  he  is  incapable  himself.     In  the 

£     career  of  Bonaparte,  in  his  ideal  schemes,  and  in  the  idolatry 

•    which  has  been  paid  to  him,  we  seem  to  get  a  glimpse  of  this 

J.  tj'pe  of  man.    To  do  good  was  not  his  object. 

And  here  I  am  compelled  to  leave  the  subject.    That  I  have 

treated  it  so  very  imperfectly  does  not  cause  me  much  regret, 

t  because  I  never  expected  to  do  otherwise.     I  shall  consider 

1  myself  to  have  succeeded  in  some  degree  if  I  hare  conveyed 

to  >i[iv  of  y^^u  a  clear  notion  of  the  vray  in  which  I  think  great 

i|  historical  phenomena  should  be  treated,  that  is,  by  shaking  off 

I  the  traiflniels  of  narrative,  proposing  definite  problems  and 

>  considering  them  deliberately ;  I  shall  have  succeeded   still 

Yy  better  if  I  have  shown  j'ou  how  the  historian  should  regard 

^  bimsclf  as  a  man  of  science,  not  a  man  of  literature :  how  he 

„-  must  have  not  only  a  rigid  method  in  research  but  a  precise  po- 

„ .  litic^  philosophy  with  principles  fixed  and  terms  de^cd  much 

nttiofc^  carefully  than  historians  have  generally  thought  neces- 

j^  ^wy ;  but  I  ^hall  only  have  succeeded  altogether  to  my  wish  if 

(vl  li^nre  also  .mpressed  upon  some  of  you  the  immense  impor- 

1^  tasc^  of  these  great  topics  of  recent  histor\v  the  urgent  ne* 

^cesaitT,  it  w>e  would  handle  properly  the  poHtical  problems  of 

oar  own  time,  of  raising  the  study  of  recent  history  out  of  the 

^^accountable  neglect  in  which  it  lies,  and  if  I  have  raised  in 

t  of  those  of  you  who  are  conscious  of  any  vocatloo 

L  


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  571 

to  research  and  discovery  the  question  whether  this  task — ^the 
task,  that  is,  of  welding  together  into  an  inseparable  union 
history  and  politics,  so  that  for  the  future  all  history  shall 
end  in  politics,  and  all  politics  shall  begin  in  history — be  not 
the  best  and  worthiest  task  to  which  they  can  devote  their 
lives. 

J.  R.  Seeley,  in  Macniillan's  Magazine. 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON. 

Walking  the  other  day  down  Fleet  Street,  while  the  griffin 
which  marks  the  former  site  of  Temple  Bar  was  still  a  passing 
object  of  public  curiosity,  I  stopped  for  a  minute  to  have  a 
good  look  at  that  poor,  underfed,  attenuated  brute — so  un- 
promising a  representative  of  civic  hospitability — and  to  take 
his  bearings  as  the  last  relic  of  the  material  barriers  that  once 
separated  the  city  of  London  from  that  outer  ring  which  Mr. 
Freeman  will  not  allow  us  to  call  the  Metropolis.  As  I  turned 
away  from  him  westward,  and  pursued  my  course  along  the 
embankment,  my  thoughts  naturally  reverted  to  the  time 
when  the  city  stood  as  a  visible  and  distinct  entity,  surrounded 
by  walls,  and  girt  beyond  them  with  fenny  marshes  and  green 
fields  ;  while  the  gray  towers  of  the  Abbey  which  I  saw  in  the 
distance,  half  hidden  by  the  modern  overgrowth  of  the  Par- 
liament House,  were  still  the  center  of  the  separate  village  of 
Westminster,  dividec}  from  the  great  town  by  the  long  stretch 
of  swampy  river  bank  which  we  even  yet  call  the  Strand. 
Looking  back  at  that  merchant  republic  of  London,  and  for- 
ward to  the  royal  and  imperial  borough,  the  capital  of  Eng- 
land— Westminster — the  question  forced  itself  upon  me 
vividly,  Why  should  there  be  any  town  here  at  all,  and  why 
should  that  town  be  the  largest  in  the  world  ?  We  are  all  so 
accustomed  to  take  London  for  granted,  that  we  hardly  realize 
at  first  how  extremely  complex  the  question  really  is.  That 
there  should  not  be  a  London,  or  that  it  should  not  be  just 


^mmm 


5  72  TIf£  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 


where  it  is  and  what  it  is,  seems  to  us  at  the  present  day 
almost  inconceivable.  Yet  there  are  a  great  many  questions 
mixed  up  in  the  origin  of  London  which  it  might  be  well 
worth  our  while  to  disentangle,  and.  if  possible,  to  answer.- 
Let  us  begin  by  dividing  the  problem  into  its  two  very  dis- 
tinct halves,  and  after  that  we  may  attempt  the  minor  sub-i 
divisions  separately. 

First  of  all,  there  is  the  question.  Why  should  there  be  a 
great  town  about  the  spot  where  the  city  now  stands?  Anc 
secondly,  there  is  the  question,  Why  should  the  capital  of  th( 
United  Kingdom  and  of  the  British  Empire  be  at  Westmin 
ster  ?  These  two  questions  are  quite  distinct ;  and  the  fac 
presupposed  in  the  one  is  quite  different  from  the  fact 
supposed  in  the  other.  Even  if  the  political  center 
empire  had  happened  to  be  at  York  or  Edinburgh,  a 
Chester  or  Lichfield  there  must  have  been  a  consii 
commercial  town  about  the  point  up  to  which  the 
continues  to  be  navigable  for  ocean-going  vessels ;  an< 
if  there  had  been  no  great  river  in  the  neighborhood  of 
minster,  a  considerable  administrative  and  fashionable 
must  have  grown  up  around  the  Court  and  the  Hoi 
Parliament.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Metropolis  com 
two  great  towns  rolled  into  one,  and  each  of  them  addii 
portance  to  the  other :  London,  the  largest  seaport* 
kingdom ;  and  Westminster,  the  political  capital  of  the 
dom.  But  that  they  might  easily  bwe  existed  se^ 
from  one  another  we  can  see  by  going  no  further 
than  to  Edinburgh  and  Glasgow;  while  we  get  the  sd 
even  more  clearly  -accentuated  in  the  case  of  New  Y 
Washington, 

Then,  besides  these  greater  questions,  there  are  a 
of  minor  questions  mixed  up  with  the  present  grei 
the  Metropolis.     Paris  is  the  capital  of  a  larger  and 
populous  state  than  London,  yet  it  is  not  quite  half 
Of  course  it  will  be  objected  that  Paris  is  not  a 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON,  573 

merely  an  administrative,   legal,  ecclesiastical,  commercial, 
a.xid  literary  center.    True,  but  Marseilles  is  the  greatest  sea- 
port of  France,  and  Lyon  the  greatest  manufacturing  town  of 
France  ;  yet  Paris,  Marseilles,  and  Lyon,  put  together,  do  not 
make  up  two-thirds  ol  London.    Again,  we  may  grant  that 
t.here  must  have   been   a  modern  city  where   London   now 
stands,  even  if  there  had  never  been  one   till   late   in   the 
eighteenth  century;  just  as  a  great  city  necessarily  grew  up 
at  Liverpool  as  soon  as  the  cotton  of  America  required  a  port 
of  entry  in  the  neighborhood  of  the   rich  Lancashire   and 
Yorkshire  coal  district,  and  as  soon  as  a  port  of  exit  was  re- 
quired in  return   for  the  towns  of  Manchester,  Blackburn, 
Wigan,  Bolton,  Burnley,  Middleton,  Oldham,  Rochdale,  Leeds, 
Bradford,  Wakefield,  Barnsley,  and  Sheffield,  which  sprang 
up  above  that  very  coal.     But  why  was  there  a  relatively  im- 
portant town  of  London  in  mediaeval  times,  in  early  English 
time,  and  in  Roman  times?    Questions  like  this  can  only  be 
answered  by  making  a  regular  historical  survey  of  the  causes 
which  led  to  the  existence  of  London. 

Ln  Qew  countries,  we  can  easily  guess  why  towns  grow  up  - 
in  one  place  rather  than  another,  because  the  causes  which 
produced  them  are  still  in  action.  We  see  at  once  how  such 
a  harbor  as  that  of  New  York  necessarily  attracts  to  itself 
almost  all  the  import  trade  of  America ;  how  Chicago,  situated 
at  the  deepest  bend  of  Lake  Michigan,  in  the  very  center  of 
the  finest  corn-growing  country  of  the  world,  naturally  be- 
comes the  port  of  shipment  for  the  surplus  grain  of  that 
fertile  level;  how  Cincinnati  was  predestined  to  be  the 
metropolis  of  pork  ;  and  how  New  Orleans  inevitably  collects 
all  the  cotton  of  the  Mississippi  basin.  So,  too,  a  glance  at 
the  position  of  Montreal  shows  us  that  it  must  of  necessity 
be  thp  commercial  capital  of  Canada ;  and  a  first  view  of  Mel- 
bourne sufficiently  reveals  why  it  is  the  one  great  town  of 
Australia.  But  in  older  countries,  the  causes  which  led  to 
the  existence  of  cities  are  often  more  difficult  to  discover,  be- 


5  74  T^^  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

cause  the  circumstances  have  since  changed  so  widely.  It 
is  not  easy  on  the  first  hlush  to  guess  why  Paris  should  have 
gathered  around  two  muddy  islets  in  the  Seine,  or  why  Rome 
arose  upon  two  low  hills  which  swell  up  slightly  from  the 
malarious  levels  of  the  Campagna.  A  hasty  mind  mig^ht 
fancy  that  such  towns  were  purely  capricious  or  accidental  in 
their  origin.  But,  if  we  look  the  question  fairly  in  the  face, 
we  cannot  fail  to  see  that  definite  reasons  must  always  have 
induced  men  to  aggregate  around  one  spot  rather  than  an- 
other. No  town,  no  village,  no  single  house  even,  ever  arises 
without  a  sufficient  cause  pre-existing  for  its  exact  place  and 
nature.  Whenever  a  man  takes  up  his  abode  anywhere,  he 
idoes  so  because  he  finds  life  easier  there  than  in  any  other 
accessible  spot. 

Apparently,  the  very  first  London  was  a  Welsh  village — ^an 
ancient  British  village,  the  history  books  would  say— which 
crowned  the  top  of  Ludgate  Hill,  near  where  St.  Paul's  now 
stands.  The  old  Welsh,  who  owned  Bntain  before  the  Eng- 
lish took  it,  were  a  race  half  hunters,  half  cultivators,  as 
Caesar  tells  us.  In  his  time,  the  Britons  of  the  southeastern 
country,  which  consists  of  open,  cultivable  plains,  were  tillers 
of  the  soil ;  while  those  of  the  hilly  northwest  were  still  pas- 
toral nomads  or  savage  hunters,  dwelling  in  movable  vil- 
lages, and  having  mere  empty  forts  on  the  hilltops,  to  which 
the  whole  population  retreated  with  their  cattle  in  case  of  in- 
vasion. These  duns,  or  hill-forts,  still  exist  in  numbers  over 
all  England,  and  are  generally  known  as  "  British  camps." 
Such  names  as  Sinodun,  Brendon,  and  Wimbledon  still  pre- 
serve their  memory :  while  we  are  familiar  with  the  Latinized 
form  in  Camalodunum,  Moridunum,  and  Branodunum.  Dune- 
din,  Dunbar,  Dundee,  and  Dunkeld,  give  us  Scottish  forms  of 
like  implication.  Down  and  Dune  survive  as  modified  piod- 
ern  words  with  the  same  root.  As  a  rule  the  syllables  dun"*  ' 
and  don  in  place-names  are  sure  indications  of  an  old  hill-fort,  1 
the  "  castles  "  or  rude  earthworks  which  crown  almost  every 


>. 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON,  575 

iieight  ambng  the  South  Downs  and  the  western  hills  are  the 
last  remains  of  these  old  Welsh  strongholds.  Maiden  Castle, 
near  Dorchester,  and  the  earthworks  at  Cissbury,  Silchester, 
and  Ogbufy,  are  familiar  instances. 

Even  before  the  Romans  came,  however,  the  river-valleys 
of  the  southeast  of  Britain  were  inhabited  by  agricultural 
tribes,  with  fixed  habitations  and  considerable  towns.  There 
are  two  great  basins  in  England  which  have  always  possessed 
the  highest  agricultural  importance :  the  one  is  that  of  the 
Ihames,  the  other  that  of  the  Yorkshire  Ouse.  So  long  as 
England  remained  mainly  an  agricultural  country,  the  two 
g^reatest  cities  of  the  landwere  the  respective  centers  of  these 
}asins,  London  and  York.  And  there  has  been  more  than 
)ne  moment  in  our  history  when  it  might  have  seemed  doubt- 
ul  which  was  to  become  ultimately  the  capital  of  the  whole 
:ingdom. 

Now,  what  made  London  the  center  o'f  the  Thames  valley? 
3r  that  of  course  was  the  first  step  towards  making  it  the 
letropolis  of  the  British  empire.  Well,  the  Welsh  tribe 
''hich  inhabited  the  lower  part  of  the  valley  must  have  origi- 
ally  needed  a  dun  like  all  their  neighbors.  But  there  are 
ot  many  conspicuous  hills  in  the  flat  basin  of  the  Thames 
etween  Richmond  and  the  sea ;  and  Ludgate  Hill  was  per- 
aps  the  best  that  the  Trinobantes  of  Middlesex  could  get. 

0  be  sure,  it  could  not  compare  with  the  dun  at  Edinburgh, 
;  Dumbarton,  or  at  Stirling ;  but  it  was  high  enough  to  make 
natural  fort,  and  it  stood  just  above  the  point  where  the  tide 

distinctly  felt.  Thus,  as  the  old  Welsh  became  gradually 
ore  and  more  civilized,  a  regular  town  grew  up  around  the 
w  dun,  and  bore  from  the  very  first  its  m#dern  name  of 
>ndon,  for  no  name  in  England  has  altered  so  little  with  the 
;ar  and  tear  of  centuries.  It  was  not  without  natural  ad- 
ntagfes  of  situation ;  for  a  belt  of  marches  girt  it  round  on 
pry  side,  from  the  estuary  of  the  Lea  and  the  Finsbury  flats 

1  th^    Fleet  river  and  London  Fen,  where  the  Strand  now 


SyS  The  library  magazine. 

stretches.  In  the  interval  between  Caius  Caesar's  abortive  ^ 
attempt  upon  Britain,  and  the  reduction  of  the  south  coast ' 
under  Claudius,  we  know  that  a  considerable  trading  town 
developed  around  the  old  village.  Cunobelin,  wfiose  coins 
of  Roman  type  are  still  found  from  Norwich  and  Chester  ta 
Kent,  had  his  palace  at  the  neighboring  station  of  Camalo-: 
dunum  ;  but  London  was  the  center  of  such  rude  trade  as  yet 
existed.  Trackways  still  traceable  radiated  thence  all  over 
the  eastern  counties  and  the  south  coast,  where  the  traffic- 
with  Gaul  was  already  important.  ' 

It  is  a  great  advantage  to  merchants  and  shippers  to  ascend 
a  navigable  river  as  far  as  possible  into  the  center  of  the' 
countrj%  because  they  have  thus  the  largest  circle  of  customer* 
for  their  goods;  and  this  is  especially  important  in  early 
stages  of  civilization,  when  means  of  land  transport  are  de^ 
ficient.  Accordingly  we  see  that  in  early  times  a  great  town 
is  to  be  found  at  the  head  of  navigation  of  every  great  riverJ 
If  we  take  the  map  of  England,  we  shall  notice  that  almost 
all  the  chief  old  county  towns,  such  as  Leicester,  Gloucester; 
and  York,  are  so  situated.  At  a  later  date,  we  get  almost 
direct  seaports,  like  Glasgow,  Liverpool,  and  Bristol ;  but  it 
a  primitive  culture  these  ports  would  be  far  less  useful,  al 
well  as  less  defensible,  than  those  which  stand  on  rivers  row 
ning  far  inland,  and  so  command  a  whole  circle  of  countr||| 
instead  of  a  mere  semicircle,  as  is  the  case  with  coastwia 
towns.  We  must  remember  that  railways  have  wholly  revol# 
tionized  the  carrying  trade  in  this  respect ;  but  the  import 
ance  of  canals  before  the  introduction  of  the  railway  system 
shows  clearly  how  necessary  was  a  good  waterway  for  a  cot* 
mercial  town. '  Now,  the  Thames  is  navigable  for  a  furthd 
distance  from  the  sea  than  any  other  river  inEngland,  and  ft 
valley,  as  we  have  already  seen,  is  one  of  the  most  valirtM 
agricultural  districts.  Here,  then,  we  have  the  very  cctt^ 
tions  necessary  for  the  rise  of  a  commercial  town  ;  and  evd 
at  this  early  period — as  sooji,  in  fact,  as  trafiic  with  Gastf 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON,  577 

a  at  all — ^there  must  have  been  such  a  commercial  town 
lere  London  now  stands.    The  site  bears  the  same  relation 

the  Thames  that  Montreal  bears  to  the  St.  Lawrence. 
xreover,  the  river  points  eastward  towards  the  Continent ; 
i  this,  though  a  shght  disadvantage  at  the  present  day, 
len  our  trade  lies  mostly  outward  with  America,  India, 
tina,  and  the  colonies,  was  an  advant^e  when  trade  lay 
K>lly  with  Gaul  and  the  south.  Thus  it  happens  that  all 
roughout  the  Middle  Ages  our  ports  and  commercial  cities 
re  all  on  the  east  and  south  coast,  or  the  rivers  which 
wed  towards  them  ;  while  at  present  Glasgow.  Liverpool, 
d  Bristol  on  the  west  are  far  more  important  than  Hull, 
nderland,  and  Newcastle  on  the  east. 
For  these  reasons,  therefore,  even  in  the  half  savage  realm 

Cunobelin,  London  was  the  chief  commercial  town'.  We 
ist  not,  however,  think  of  it  as  a  town  in  the  modern  sense  : 
>  must  rather  figure  it  to  ourselves  as  a  stockaded  village  of 
de  huts,  with  its  central  hill-fort,  not  much  more  civilized 
an'  the  King  Bonny's  Town  or  King  Long's  town  of  Western 
Tica  in  our  own  time.  The  adventurous  merchants  from 
lul  or  further  south  who  ascended  the  river  to  trade  with 
e  natives  would  get  as  far  as  London,  where  already  (so  Dio 
fcssius  tells  us)  a  primitive  wooden  London  Bridge — doubt- 
Bs  a  mere  foot-rail,  for  wayfarers— blocked  their  further  pas- 
ge  up  the  unknown  stream.  Here  they  would  traiRc  with 
ie  native  dealers,  who  in  turn  would  dispatch  the  foreign 
anufactured  goods  of  the  great  southern  civilization  to  every 
>int  of  the  compass  along  the  rough  trackways.  We  must 
iC  in  it  all  a  picture  much  like  that  of  our  own  pioneers  in 
le  South  Seas  or  Central  Africa,  taking  the  red  cotton  of 
ianchester  or  the  glass  beads  of  Venice,  and  receiving  in 
iturn  the  raw  products,  ivory  or  palm  oil,  of  the  savage  land, 
hat.  I  take  it,  is  how  the  city  of  London  began  to  be. 

When  the  Romans  conquered  Britain,  the  aspect  of  affairs 
hanged  a  little.    The  conquerors  turned  the  island  into  an 
L.  M.— 19 


57^  .  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

agricultural  exporting  country,  a  subsidiary  granary  for  till 
crowded  southern  cities  which  already  devoured  all  the  con 
of  Egypt  and  the  Black  Sea.  So  Britain  was  to  Rome  mud 
what  America  is  to  modern'  England.  And  just  as  the  moi 
important  wheat-growing  parts  of  America  consist  of  the  9 
Lawrence  and  northern  Mississippi  basin,  so  the  most  import 
ant  wheat-growing  parts  of  Roman  Britain  consisted  of  thi 
valley  of  the  Ouse  and  the  valley  of  the  Thames.  But  of  thesa 
two  the  great  plain  of  York,  iormed  by  the  tributaries  of  the 
Ouse  and  draining  into  the  Humber,  is  certainly  the  largest  and 
most  fruitful.  Hence,  for  Roman  purposes,  York  was  th« 
principal  town  of  the  island,  and  the  Romans  erected  there 
their  provincial  capital  of  Eboracum.  Even  when  two  prefects 
were  appointed,  the  southern  usilally  had  his  station,  not  at 
Londinium,  but  at  Verulamium,  or  St.  Albans.  London,  how- 
ever, must  have  largely  increased  in  commercial  importance 
none  the  less,  though  officially  slighted  ;  for  as  the  trade  with 
the  Roman  world  grew  larger,  traffic  must  have  come  more 
and  more  to  the  mouth  of  the  Thames.  Indeed,  the  great 
number  of  well-known  stations  in  the  neighborhood — Veru- 
1am,  Camalodunum,  Rhutupiae,  Dubris,  and  others — sufficiently 
shows  that  the  Thames  valley  and  the  direct  road  to  the  Con- 
tinent were  of  immense  value.  All  the  main  Roman  roads 
converged  on  London  because  the  river  could  there  be  cross- 
ed ;  and  these  roads  became  the  framework  for  the  whole 
carrying  system  of  England,  till  canals  and  railways  revolu- 
tionized the  highways  of  the  country.  The  Roman  remains 
occasionally  dug  up  in  the  city  show  that  Londinium  was  a 
place  of  some  pretensions.  It  was  probably  even  tb  a  cOm- 
largest  town  in  Britain.  Perhaps  its  population  may  alre^S^' 
have  amounted  to  as  many  as  twelve  or  fifteen  thousand  souls. 
We  must  pass  rapidly,  however,  over  these  earlier  stages  of 
its  history,  and  come  on  to  the  time  when  Britain  changed  its 
face  and  became  known  as  England.  The  details  of  the  Efigjish 
conquest  and  colonization  are  so  vague  and  mytiuca^llkW 

1 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  5/9 

know  absolutely  nothing  about  the  fate  of  London  in  the 
great  revolution  which  handed  over  Britain  from  the  Roman- 
ized and  Christianized  Welsh  to  the  savage  and  heathen  Eng- 
lish pirates.  The  narrative  of  the  Chronicle  mentions  the^ 
city  but  once,  and  that  was  when  Hengst  and  M%iz — the  Horse 

*  and  his  son  the  Ash-tree — fought  with  the  Britons  at  Crayford  ;  . 

"the  Britons  then  forsook  Kent-land,  and  with  mickle  awe 
fled  to  Lunden-bury."  They  would  find  themselves  safe  behind 
the  walls  of  the  Roman  municipium.  Of  the  actual  conquest 
of  the  city  we  have  no  record  at  all ;  a  loss  for  which  we  can 
console  ourselves  by  the  consideration  that  even  if  we  had 
one,  it  would  be  of  no  historical  value  whatsoever.  The  annals 
of  the  "Anglo-Saxons"  before  the  arrival  of  Augustine  are 
for  the  most  part  a  mere  fabulous  tissue  of  heroic  genealogies, 
distorted  heathen  legends,  bad  philology,  and  old  myths  fitted 
to  new  persons  and  places.  But  one  fact  we  do  know  with 
certainty :  that  at  some  time  or  other  a  band  of  English  pirates, 
belonging  to  the  Saxon  tribe,  settled  down  around  London, 
and  Ihat  from  their  settlement  the  surrounding  country  has 
ever  since  borne  the  name  of  Middlesex.*  We  can  even  trace 
the  actual  clans  or  families  which  made  themselves  home- 
steads in  the  neighboring  lands.  The  Readings  settled  at  Pad- 
drngton,  the  Kensings  at  Kensington,  the  Billings  at  Billings- 
gate, the  Ealings  at  Ealing,  the  Harlings  at  Harlington,  the 
Isllngs^at  Islington,  the  TaedingsatTeddington,the  Wappings 
at  Wapping,  and  the  Nottings  at  Notting  Hill.  Just  south  of 
the  river,  too,  on  the  Surrey  shore,  we  find  traces  of  the  Ken- 
nings  at  Kennington  and  the  Niwings  at  Newington.  Thus 
the.  city  is  girt  round  on  every  side  by  obvious  colonies  of 
.-  ^English  pirates. 

the.  ^  But  did  the  English  sack  and  burn  "  Lunden-bury  "  itself, 
and  utterly  massacre  the  Welsh  inhabitants?     For  my  part,  I 

*  Territorially,  London  itself  was  in  Essex,  though  it  was  usually  ruled  by  Mercia. 
Only  the  drainage  of  the  estuary  of  the  Lea  (now  the  Isle  of  Dogs),  which  was  made 
'    part  of  Middlesex,  caused  London  to  be  surrounded  by  that  doubtful  county. 


58o  "   THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

can  never  believe  it.      We  have  numberless  bits  of  evidence 
which  go  to  prove  that  the  inhabitants  of  the  Romanized 
towns  made  their  peace  with  the   English   barbarians,  and 
bought  themselves  off  from  the  fate  which  overtook  a  few  of 
the  stubborn  t:oastwise  ports.    The  Welsh  records  are  full  of 
complaints  against  the  Lloegrians  of  the  town  who  "became 
as  Saxons."    The  early  English  colonists,  we  know,  were  not 
a  people  of  merchants ;  they  were  simply  savage  soldiers  on 
the  war-trail,  who  settled  down  slowly  after  the  conquest  into 
farmers  and  landowners.    They  avoided  the  old  towns,  which 
always  bear  their  original  Celtic  or  Roman  names,  and  are 
never  called  after  English  clans,  like  the  modern  villages  now 
grown  into  great  trading  communities,  such  as  Birmingham 
and  Warrington.    The  Chronicle  tells  us  expressly  that  *'  -^lle 
and  Cissa  beset  Artderida,andoffslew  all  that  were  there  in,  nor 
was  there  after  one  Briton  left  alive."  '  But  if  tradition  kept 
up  the  memory  of  the  fate  which  befell  this  comparatively 
unimportant  fortress,  Pevensey — doubtless  because  it  resisted 
the  invaders  too  stoutly,  trusted  to  its  Roman  walls — it  is 
credible  that  it  should  have  quite  forgotten  the  sack  of  Lon- 
don, the  largest  and  richest  town  in  the  whole  countiy.^    In 
later  days  we  know  historically  that  the  Londoners  bought 
themselves  off,  time  after  time,  from  the  Danish  pirates;  arid 
they  probably  did  the  same  with  the  earlier  English  pirates  as 
well.     It  seems  to  me  most  likely  that  numbers  of  English 
settled  in  and  around  London ;  that  a  petty  English   king 
ruled  over  it ;  and  that  English  soon  became  the  ordinary 
la^nguage  of  the  town ;  but  I  believe  that  many  Romanized 
Welsh  merchants  still  continued  to  live  and  trade  there,  that 
the  urban  mob  passed  quietly  into  the  condition  of  English 
churls,  and  perhaps  even  that  Christianity  in  a  debased  form 
lingered  on   among  the   inferior  people   till   the   arrival  of 
Augustine.     It  is  a  significant  fact  that  we  never  hear  of  the 
conversion  of  Middlesex.    On  the  other  hand,  the  Anglicized 
Welsh  of  London  may  well  have  become  pagans  to  suit  the 


K 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  5^1 

taste  of  their  conquerors,  just  as  the  Christians  of  Southern 
Spain  became  Mohammedans  under  the  Moors,  while  the 
Moors  again  became  Christians  under  the  Castilian  kings. 
Language  and  religion  tell  us  very  little  as  to  blood  and  race. 

However  all  this  may  be,  it  is  at  least  certain  that  London 
still  remained  the  most  important  commercial  town  under  the 
English,  as  it  had  been  under  the  Romans.  Yet  it  did  not 
then  bid  fair  to  become  the  capital  of  the  future  consolidated 
kingdom.  We  have  two  English  archbishops,  whose  titles 
and  provinces  date  back  to  the  earliest  days  of  Christianity 
among  the  English,  and  they  have  their  cathedrals  at  York 
and  Canterbury  respectively.  But  there  has  never  been  an 
archbishop  of  London.  Why  is  this  ?  Well,  Canterbury  was 
the  capital  of  ^thelberht  of  Kent,  the  overlord  of  the  whole 
south,  and  the  first  Christian  English  king-;  and  Augustine 
himself  bore  the  title.  York  was  the  capital  of  Eadwine  of 
Northumbria,  the  overlord  of  the  whole  north  ;  and  PauHnus 
was  the  first  archbishop.  But  London  was  not  yet  the  capital 
of  a  large  kingdom  at  all ;  it  lay,  like  a  sort  of  Bcrwdck-upon- 
Tweed,  in  the  debatable  ground  between  Kent,  Surrey,  Essex, 
alid  Wessex.  Hence,  like  the  other  minor  kingdoms,  it  had 
only  a  bishop,  who  was  originally  the  bishop  of  a  people  ;  not 
an  archbishop,  who  was  originally  set  beside  the  central  over- 
lord, as  chief  bishop  of  the  whole  communEty.  When  Eng- 
land slowly  consolidated  into  the  three  main  divisions  which 
still  subsist  so  markedly,  Northumbria,  Mercia,  and  Wcssex — 
the  North,  the  Midlands,  and  the  South— King  OlTaof  Mercia 
set  up  his  own  archbishop  at  Lichfield;  but  Mercia  was  a 
short-lived  power,  and  the  South  opposed  the  innovation  ;  so 
only  the  two  older  titles  and  provinces  have  survived  to  our 
own  day. 

And  what  made  London  the  final  capital  of  Wessex  ?  For 
Wessex  had 'at  first  more  than  one  capital,  its  kings  living 
sometimes  at  Dorchester  on  the  Thames  (near  Oxford),  and 
.sometimes  at  Winchester,  the  old  Roman  town  which  com* 


582  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

manded  the  rich  valleys  of  the  Itchin  and  Test.  We  must 
remember  that  royal  towns  are  more  apparently  capricious 
than  commercial  centers.  Wherever  a  king  chooses  to  reside, 
he  can  gather  his  administrative  bodies  arouryi  him ;  but  trade 
will  only  go  where  trade  pays.  Louis  XIV.  could  make  or 
unmake  a  Versailles ;  but  he  could  not  make  or  unmake  a 
Havre  or  a  Lyons.  Yet  great  towns  have  often  grown  up 
around  mere  king-made  centers,  because  their  situation  was 

,at  least  as  good  as  any  other.  Paris  itself  largely  owes  its 
existence  to  the  fact  that  its  counts  became  by  slow  degrees 
kings  of  all  France.  Berlin  owes  still  more  to  the  luck  and 
the  perseverance  of  the  HohenzoU^rns. "  ^t.  Petersburgh 
exists  mainly  because  Peter  willed  it.  Yet  all  these  towns 
have  also  advantages  of  their  own.  Laon  could  never  have 
been  what  Paris  is :  Moscow,  isolated  in  the  midst  of  a  bound- 
less plain,  could  never  have  become  like  St.  Petersbrrgh  on 
its  navigable  river.  The  ridiculous  failure  of  Washington 
shows  one  that  a  mere  administrative  center  will  not  of  itself 
attract  population,  unless  there  are  commercial  advantages  in 
its  very  situation.  Still,  the  royal  initiative  counts  for  much  ; 
and  London  would  never  have  been  all  that  it  actually  is  if 
Northumbria  or  Merica  had  become  the  leading  state  in  Eng- 
land, instead  of  Wessex.  In  either  of  those  cases,  we  might 
have  had  an  administrative  capital  at  York  or  X-ichfield,  and  a 
commercial  capital  at  London.  Our  Edinburgh  and  our  Glas- 
gow might  have  been  separated,  as  they  now  are  in  Scotland. 
Injdeed,  in  early  English  days,  Northumbria  still  retained  the 
same  position  of  supiremacy  as  in  Roman  times,  and  for  the 
same  reason — because  the  plain  of  Humber  is  the  most  impor- 
tant agricultural  tract  in  Britain.    York  was  then  the  real  cap- 

»  ital  of  England ;  and  even  as  late  as  the  reign  of  Charles  I. 

it  remained  the  second  city  in  the  kingdom.    That  was  why 

members  of  the  royal  family  so  often  bore  the  title  of  Duke 

of  York. 

The  Danish  invasions,  however,  made  the  house  .of  Wessex 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON,  5^3 

the  representative  English  dynasty;  and  London  became 
slowly  the  capital  of  Wessex.  The  north  was  left  hopelessly 
behind ;  and  the  capital  of  Wessex  became  in  turn  the  capital 
of  England.  Not  that  it  was  ever  acknowledged  suddenly  as 
such,  or  that  a  capital  in  our  modern  sense  was  possible  at  all. 
The  king  kept  court  now  at  one  place,  now  at  another.  The 
Witena-gemot,  and  afterwards  the  Parliament,  met  sometimes 
at  Oxford,  sometimes  at  London.  Winchester  remained  the 
royal  minster  an^  residence  till  Edward  the  Confessor  built 
Westminster.  Even  after  the  Conquest,  William  of  Normandy 
still  wore  his  crown  "  on  Eastertide  at  Winchester,  on  Pen- 
tecost at  Westminster,  and  on  Midwinter  at  Gloucester," 
But  from  the  days  of  Alfred  onward,  we  can  see  that  London 
becomes  more  and  more  the  real  center  of  English  life,  and 
the  administrative  capital  of  the  kingdom.  Though  royal 
personages  were  buried  at  Winchester,  they  lived  in  JLondon. 
During  the  Danish  wars,  the  great  town  grew  more  and  more 
important,  both  in  a  military  and  commercial  sense ;  and  it 
became  even  more  necessary  that  national  councils  should  be 
held  there.  Under  Canute,  London  had  become  pretty  cer- 
tainly the  real  capital.  From  year  to  year,  as  we  read  the  Eng- 
lish Chronicle,  we  can  note  that  the  city  was  growing  con- 
stantly in  size  and  political  power.  Long  before  the  Norman 
Conquest,  it  was  evidently  by  far  the  most  important  town  in 
England.  Its  walls  inclosed  a  considerable  area ;  and  on  the 
Surrey  side  its  suburb  of  Southwark — the  southern  work  or 
defense — already  formed  a  large  center  around  the  tete  du 
pont.  The  space  within  the  street  called  London  Wall  marks 
the  boundary  of  the  old  city. 

Edward  the  Confessor,  however,  put  the  final  stamp  of 
royalty  upon  London  by  building  his  "new  minster"  on 
Thorney  Island,  near  Westminster.  Before  his  day,  all  English 
kings  had  been  buried  at  Winchester.  Edward  himself  was 
buried  in  his  new  Abbey,  and  so  have  been  almost  all  his  suc- 
cessors, except  those  early  Normans  and  Angevins  who  pre- 


5 84  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ferred  their  own  ancestral  resting-places  at  Caen  and  Fon- 
tevraud.  The  Confessor's  Abbey  and  William  Rufus's  palace 
made  Westminster  the  real  royal  borough,  much  as  Windsor 
became  under  the  later  Plantagenets.  Of  course  the  new 
quarter  on  Thorney  Island  was  still  a  separate  village,  divided 
from  London  by  the  Strand ;  but  the  proximity  of  the  city  in- 
creased the  importance  of  both.  Winchester,  however,  even 
now  retains  one  mark  of  its  former  royal  connection.  There 
are  only  three  English  bishops  who  take  precedence  of  their 
brethren  apart  from  seniority  of  appointment;  and  those 
three  are,  the  Bishop  of  London,  the  new  capital ;  the  Bishop 
of  Winchester,  the  old  capital ;  and  the  former  Prince-Bishop 
of  Durham,  the  County  Palatine,  which  formed  the  mark 
against  the  Scots,  and  where  alone,  as  at  Sion  and  so  many 
other  Swiss  or  German  towns,  the  fortified  Episcopal  palace 
castle  still  rises  opposite  the  great  cathedral. 

The  Norman  Conquest  itself  marks  another  critical  epoch 
in  the  history  of  London.  For  that  conquest  really  decided 
the  whole  future  relations  of  England  with  the  Continent 
From  the  days  of  Swegen  and  Canute,  Britain  had  been,  more 
or  lessi  a  mere  dependency  of  Scandinavia  and  Denmark. 
Even  during  the  reign  of  Edward  the  Confessor, -it  had  looked 
northward  as  much  as  southward  ;  for  though  the  king  him- 
self was  thoroughly  Norman  at  heart,  and  filled  the  highest 
offices  with  Normans  Whenever  he  was  able,  Godwin  and  his 
sons  were  Danish  rather  than  English  in  sentiment  and  in- 
terests ;  and  the  revolution  which  restored  them  to  power 
and  finally  placed  Harold  on  the  throne,  was  at  bottom  the 
revival  of  a  Danish  party.  In  fact,  the  only  real  question  at 
th^  time  of  the  Conquest  was  this — ^whether  England  should 
be  ruled  by  Scandinavians  from  the  north  or  by  Scandinavians 
from  the  south  ;  by  Harold  of  Norway  or  by  William  of  Nor- 
mandy. If  Harold  the  Norwegian  had  conquered  at  Stamford 
Bridge,  England  would  have  been  thrown  into  a  great  norUi- 
em  confederacy,  and  its  natural  capital  would  have  been  YoAi. , 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  $85 

the  Danish  headquarters,  with  its  Hnmber  mouth  pointing 
straight  towards  the  Scandinavian  north.  But  the  victory  of 
the  English  Harold  over  the  Norse  Harold  paved  the  way 
quietly  for  William,  and  William's  success  drew  England  for  a 
hundred  years  into  close  connection  with  the  Romance  civ- 
ilization of  the  opposite  continent.  Thus  the  north  sank  ut- 
terly in  importance ;  Northumberland  was  turned  into  a  waste, 
as  a  mark  or  boundary  against  the  Scots;  York  became  a 
mere  provincial  town,  and  London,  Winchester.  Canterbury, 
and  the  Cinque  Ports  remained  steadily  the  centers  of  English 
administrative  or  commercial  life.  Lanfranc  brought  the 
church  into  closer  relation  with  Rome ;  while  the  Norman 
and  Angevin  kings,  and  the  nobility  whom  they  introduced, 
brought  the  whole  country  into  closer  relation  with  France 
and  Flanders.  Even  when  the  Plantagenets  had  settled  down 
into  a  thoroughly  English  dynasty,  the  effects  of  the  new  turn 
given  to  English  life  was  still  obvious.  The  trade  encouraged 
by  Edward  I.  was  trade  in  wool  with  the  Flemish  cities,  and 
trade  in  silk  and  wine  with  Paris  and  Bordeaux.  The  cam- 
paigns of  Edward  III.  and  Henry  V.  all  turned  towards  the 
Seine  and  the  Garonne.  In  short,  by  the  Norman  Conquest, 
England  was  wholly  dissevered  from  her  old  connection  with 
the  Scandinavian  barbarism,  and  made  a  member  of  the  Ro- 
mance civilization.  And  this  change  firmly  established  Lon- 
don as  the  natural  commercial  center  of  the  island  all  through 
the  middle  ages. 

There  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  population  of  England  in- 
creased but  very  slowly  in  the  interval  between  the  Conquest 
and  the  Reformation.  Though  a  little  foreign  trade  sprang  up 
under  Edward  Land  grew  largely  under  the  Yorkist  kings,  yet 
the  country  remained,  as  a  whole,  agricultural  in  habits,  and  so 
the  people  increased  at  a  very  slow  rate.  Nevertheless,  London 
evidently  grew  far  faster  than  in  proportion  to  the  growth  else- 
where ;  for  trade  was  naturally  concentrated  upon  it,  and  the 
administrative  needs  of  the  settled  Plantagenet  kingdom  wer 


586  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

relatively  far  greater  than  thpseof  the  rude  Saxon  realm.  As 
of  old,  all  the  roads  radiated  from  London,  for  the  start  given 
it  by  the  Romans  always  made  it  the  most  convenient  dis- 
tributing center  in  England.  Yet  all  through  the  middle 
ages  we  may  safely  say  that  no  fresh  causes  affected  its 
growth.  The  accretion  was  but  the  natural  development  of 
its  existing  advantages.  The  reign  of  Elizabeth  first  intro- 
duced any  new  factors  into  the  calculation.  These  new  fac- 
tors depended  upon  the  westward  movement.  The  discovery 
of  America  and  of  the  new  route  to  India  by  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  was  revolutionizing  the  commerce  and  the  civilization 
of  the  world.  Up  to  the  sixteenth  century,  the  Mediterranean 
was  still  the  center  of  culture  and  traffic  for  ail  Christendom- 
The  seventeenth  century  turned  the  course  of  both  away 
from  the  Mediterranean  to  the  Atlantic.  The  importance 
which  had  once  belonged  to  Rome,  Florence,  Venice,  and 
Genoa,  became  transferred  at  once  to  Paris  and  London,  and 
finally  also  to  Liverpool,  Glasgow,  New  York,  and  Philadel- 
phia. It  was  this  great  revolution  which  really  made  Eng- 
land— and,  by  implication,  London  also — what  it  is. 

England  stands  in  a  singularly  favorable  position  for  com- 
merce, as  soon  as  navigation  has  extended  to  the  wide  seas. 
It  is  an  island,  joined  by  water  to  every  other  country  of  the 
earth,  instead  of  being  isolated,  like  Germany  and  Austria,  by 
blocks  of  land  shutting  it  out  from  the  universal  highway  of 
the  sea.  It  has  navigable  rivers  and  splendid  harbors  point- 
ing north,  south,  east,  and  west.  Oddly  enough,  it  occupies, 
with  exact  precision,  the  very  central  point  in  the  hemisphere 
of  greatest  land ;  so  that  it  is  actually  nearer  all  seaports  in 
the  world,  taken  together,  than  any  other  spot  can  possibly 
be.  And  at  the  moment  when  navigation  of  the  wide  seas 
became  practicable,  when  new  routes  were  opened  to  America 
and  to  the  East,  it  happened  to  occupy  the  nearest  position 
to  the  centers  of  the  old  trade  and  manufacture  on  the  one 
♦he  fresh  El  Dorados  on  the  others.    Thus  Eiig- 


,        THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  $8/ 

land  almost  necessarily  became  the  colonizer  of  America  and 
the  conqueror  of  India.  The  Elizabethan  outburst  was,  in 
fact,  the  immediate  result  of  this  new  direction  given  to  Eng- 
lish enterprise.  Hitherto,  English  merchants  had  traded  to 
Flanders  and  to  Bordeaux,  or,  as  a  long  voyage,  to  the 
Mediterranean.  Now,  our  Raleighs,  Frobishers,  and  Drakes 
began  exploring  the  whole  round  world,  and  our  Roes  com- 
menced the  Indian  connection  at  the  court  of  Ajmere.  A 
single  generation  stood  between  the  middle  ages  and  our 
own  time.  The  England  of  Wolsey  was  almost  mediaeval ; 
the  England  of  Shakespeare,  Raleigh,  and  Bacon  was  wholly 
modern.  London  began  to  grow  rapidly  from  the  very  com- 
mencement of  this  new  epoch,  and  it  continued  to  grow  un- 
interruptedly till  the  period  of  this  next  great  change.  One 
may  trace  the  growth  by  the  names  of  streets,  from  the  Eliza- 
bethan Strand,  through  Restoration  St.  James's,  to  the  Queen 
Anne  district  round  Harley  Street.  By  the  time  of  Charles 
II.,  the  difference  in  size  between  the  capital  and  all  the  other 
towns  of  Britain  seems  to  have  been  vastly  greater  than  it 
had  ever  been  before  or  since.  In  the  early  middle  ages, 
York,  Oxford,  and  Winchester  were  great  towns  not  un- 
worthy to  be  compared  with  the  London  of  the  same  day;  in 
our  own  time,  Glasgow,  Liverpool,  and  Manchester  have 
some  pretensions  in  size,  even  when  compared  with  the 
metropolis :  but  in  the  England  of  Charles  II.  London  was 
first,  and  the  rest  were  nowhere.  There  was  as  yet  no  reason 
why  trade  should  seek  any  other  main  channel,  and  it  still  re- 
mained true  to  the  old  highways  which  radiated  from  the 
Thames.  Without  canals  and  railways,  the  great  inland  port 
was  necessarily  the  best  possible  center  for  commerce  in  the 
island. 

The  century  which  elapsed  between  1750  and  1850,  however, 
was  fraught  with  the  deepest  danger  for  the  supremacy  of 
London ;  and  though,  in  spite  of  the  peril,  it  has  still  grown 
on  with  alarming  rapidity,  and  has  doubled  its  population 


588  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

with  ever-increasing  frequency,  it  may  yet  be  fairly  said  that 
the  comparative  increase  is  not  so  large  as  during  the  earlier 
period.  I  am  aware  that  statistics  distinctly  point  the  other 
way;  but,  then,  the  statistics  are  wooden,  and  do  not  take 
into  account  all  the  real  elements  of  the  problem.  For  the 
fact  is,  that  London,  while  gaining  absolutely  at  an  enormous 
rate,  has  been  losing  comparatively  by  the  side  of  a  new  order 
of  towns,  which  have  come  into  being  as  the  result  of  an- 
other vast  revolution,  almost  as  important  as  the  Elizabethan. 
This  revolution  has  been  brought  about  by  the  employment 
of  coal,  first  in  the  sn>elting  and  manufacture  of  steel  and 
iron,  and  afterwards  through  the  use  of  the  steam-engine  in 
every  kind  of  industrial  pursuit.  Even  before  the  age  of 
steam,  Bristol  had  become  a  great  western  port  through  the 
influence  of  the  West  India  sugar  trade.  But  steam  was 
destined  to  change  the  traffic  with  the  colonies  and  America 
from  a  mere  reception  of  tobacco  and  cotton  to  a  great  re- 
ciprocal trade  in  jraw  materials  on  the  one  hand,  and  manu- 
factured goods  on  the  other.  We  were  to  become  the  clothiers 
and  ironmongers  of  the  world.  Coal  and  America,  put  to- 
gether, have  turned  England  round  on  a  pivot  from  east  to 
west.  She  used  to  point  eastward,  by  Thames  and  Humber, 
towards  the  Continent ;  she  now  points  westward,  by  Mersey, 
Clyde,  and  Avon,  towards  America  and  Australia.  The  south 
used  to  be  the  trading  and  manufacturing  half,  while  the 
north  was  a  wild  grazing  and  agricultural  country.  Now  the 
north  is  the  trading  and  manufacturing  part,  while  the  south 
is  mostly  a  succession  of  quiet  rural  districts.  The  great  coal 
regions  all  lie  west  or  north.  On  the  Scotch  coal-field  stand 
Glasgow,  Paisley,  and  Greenock.  On  the  Tyne  collieries  we 
'find  Newcastle,  Shields,  and  Durham  ;  while  close  at  hand 
are  Sunderland,  Stockton,  Darlington,  Middlesborough,  and 
the  Cleveland  iron  district.  The  Lancashire  field  incloses 
Manchester,  Blackburn,  Wigan,  Bolton,  St.  Helens,  Buml^, 
Middleton,  Oldham,  Rochdale,  and  Ashton.    The  cotton  ef 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON,  589 

America  and  the  wool  of  Australia  come  to  Liverpool,  to  be 
-worked  up  either  in  this  coal  region  of  in  that  of  the  West 
Riding,  which  includes  Leeds,  Bradford,  Wakefield,  Barnsley, 
Sheffield,  and  Chesterfield.  Nottingham  and  Derby  hang 
upon  its  border,  while  Hull  supplies  it  with  an  eastward  outlet. 
On  the  midland  coal-bed  stand  Wolverhampton,  Dudley, 
Wednesbury,  Walsall,  and  Birmingham.  Other  carboniferous 
deposits  occur  in  the  crowded  South  Wales  region,  around 
Swansea  and  Merthyr  Tydvil,  as  well  as  near  Bristol.  The 
influence  of  all  this  northern  and  western  development  must 
clearly  detract  so  much,  comparatively,  from  the  relative  im- 
portance of  London.  To  put  it  plainly,  London  was  once  the 
very  focus  of  national  thought  and  industry,  surrounded  on 
every. side  by  the  most  flourishing  parts  of  the  country;  it  is 
now  isolated  in  the  midst  of  the  agricultural  south,  while 
Manchester,  Liverpool,  Birmingham,  Leeds,  Sheffield,  and 
Glasgow  form  totally  distinct  and  often  antagonistic  centers 
of  political  and  industrial  life  in  the  north  and  the  midlands. 
Without  entering  into  the  realm  of  politics,  one  may  fairly 
say  that  the  existence  of  a  Manchester  school  or  a  Birming* 
.  ham  school  has  only  been  possible  in  the  last  fifty  years,  and 
has  been  rendered  possible  by  this  comparative  isolation  of 
the  capital  in  the  agricultural  south.  The  position  has  largely 
divorced  the  feelings  of  London  from  the  feelings  of  the 
industrial  centers. 

Nevertheless,  London  has  survived,  and  has  grown  more 
rapidly  than  ever.  Coal  and  steam  which  seemed  to  threaten 
her  supremacy,  have  really  strengthened  it.  Had  there  been 
no  such  things  as  railways,  it  might  have  been  otherwise. 
The  importance  of  Glasgow  and  Liverpool  would  then  have 
largely  increased,  because  there  only  can  raw  material  be 
brought  home  to  the  very  door  of  the  coal-employing  manu- 
facturer. But  railways  have  annihilated  space  so  far  as  a 
small  island  like  Britain  is  concerned,  and  the  Thames  has 
thus  retained  its  original  importance  as  a  great  navigable  riv^ 


590  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

even  as  against  the  severe  competition  of  the  Clyde  and  the 
Mersey.  There  can  be  no  doubt  at  all  that  the  two  western 
rivers  possess  greater  natural  advantages  lor  trade  in  its  pres- 
ent stage  than  does  the  Thames.  They  run  nearer  into  the 
very  heart  of  the  coal-bearing  and  manufacturing  tracts,  and 
they  are  thus  the  natural  ports  for  entry* of  all  heavy  raw  ma- 
terials, and  for  exportation  of  all  cottons,  woollen  goods  and 
hardware.  But  the  Thames  still  lies  nearest  to  the  greatest 
cent'er  of  population,  the  administrative  capital,  and  the  town 
home  of  all  the  landed  aristocracy  and  wealthy  classes  gen- 
erally. Hence,  possessing  such  a  harbor  as  London,  it  still 
manages  to  attract  the  largest  tonnage  of  any  seaport  in  the 
^ingdem.  It  is  true,  cotton,  wool,  and  raw-materials  gener- 
ally are  mostly  landed  elsewhere  ;  piece-goods,  broadcloths, 
hardware,  and  machinery  are  mostly  shipped  elsewhere  ;  but 
for  articles  of  immediate  consumption,  such  as  tea,  corn,  meat, 
cheese,  eggs,  butter,  sugar,  wine  and  spirits,  or  for  articles  of 
luxury  such  as  silks,  velvets,  carpets,  gloves,  drapery,  furs, 
and  French  and  German  products  generally,  it  is  by  far  the 
most  important  port  in  the  country.  The  railways  all  con- 
verge upon  it,  and  so  make  it  the  center  for  the  entire  whole- 
sale distributing  trade  of  Great  Britain.  Thus  the  vast  in- 
crease of  English  population  and  the  vast  development  of 
English  industry,  during  the  present  century  have  caused 
London  to  grow  with  enormous  rapidity,  in  spite  of  the  im- 
mense diversion  of  many  great  branches  of  trade  to  the  wes- 
tern ports.  Nevertheless,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
position  of  London  is  now  to  some  extent  artificial,  depending 
largely  upon  the  railways,  and  upon  its  already  established 
greatness  as  an  administrative  center  and  fashionable  agglom- 
eration of  wealthy  people.  If  there  had  been  no  old  capital 
upon  the  Thames  before  the  present  century,  it  is  doubtful 
whether  the  possession  of  its  navigable  river  could  have 
made  London,  under  existing  cpnditions,  half  as  big  as  Glas- 
-^ow  actually  is.    Taking  into  consideration  geographical  po- 


THE^  ORIGIN  OF  LONDON.  59 1 

sltion  as  regards  the  three  kingdoms,  and  central  site  as 
regards  trade,  it  may  be  said  that,  if  Britain  had  now  for  the 
first  time  to  choose  a  capital,  its  choice  would  naturally  fall 
upon  Manchester. 

And  now,  before  closing  this  necessarily  imperfect  sketch, 
let  us  ask  briefly,  What  are  the  main  elements  which  go  to 
make  up  the  population  of  London  at  the  present  day  ?  First 
of  all,  then,  taking  them  in  natural,  historical  and  geographi- 
cal order,  there  is  the  seafaring  and  shipping  element,  which 
congregates  mainly  around  the  docks,  Wapping,  and  the  tower 
district.  This  element,  though  the  West  End  now  knows  and 
thinks  little  about  it,  is  the  one  which  gives  rise  to  all  the 
others.  Then  there  is  the  great  wholesale,  commercial,  im- 
porting, distributing,  financial,  stockbroking,  and  banking 
element  which  makes  up  the  city.  Next  comes  the  legal  and 
administrative  class,  which  occupies  the  Temple,  Lincoln's 
Inn,  and  Chancery  Lane,  runs  down  the  Strand  by  Somerset 
House,  spreads  over  the  greater  part  of  Whitehall,  and  cul- 
minates in  the  Parliament  Houses  and  the  neighboring  por- 
tion of  Westminster.  After  that  we  ^^t  to  the  fashionable 
West  End,  fiom  Mayfair  and  Belgravia  to  Kensington,  Bays- 
water,  and  Notting  Hill,  with  its  retail  shopping  district 
around  Regent  Street  and  Oxford  Street.  Then  comes  the 
whole  world  of  clerks^  and  business  employes,  stretching  in 
two  great  semicircles  from  Portland  Towii  and  Kentish  Town 
to  Islington  and  Dalston  on  the  north";  and  again  from  Bat- 
tersea  and  Clapham  to  Camberwell  and  Peckham  on  the 
south.  Finally,  there  is  the  vast  and  unrecognized  mass  of 
artizans  and  working  men,  congregating  chiefly  in  the  east 
and  south,  but  scattered  up  and  down  in  slums  and  backquar- 
ters  everywhere.  Intermixed  among  these  main  divisions 
are  many  lesser  ones,  drawn  naturally  to  London  as  the  chief 
national  center:  the  worlds  of  literature,  of  journalism,  of 
medicine,  of  art,  of  the  theater,  of  science,  and,  to  some  ex- 
tent, of  education  ;  the  cabmen,  servants,  and  hangers-on  of 


59^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

wealthy  families ;  and  a  large  industrial  class  engaged  in  the 
manufacture  of  such  articles  as  can  be  easily  produced  in  the 
absence  of  coal-fields — the  last>  especially,  to  be  found  on  the 
south  side  and  in  the  suburbs.  Of  course  so  brief  a  list  must 
necessarily  include  only  the  main  headings ;  but  it  is  suffi- 
cient to  show  us  that  London  really  consists  of  two  towns 
rolled  inextricably  into  one — ^a  commercial  seaport  on  the  one 
hand,  and  an  administrative  capital  on  the  other.  In  virtue 
of  the  first  we  get  the  shipping,  the  City,  the  manufacturers, 
and  the  artizan  class ;  in  virtue  of  the  second  we  get  the 
Court,  the  Parliament,  the  West  End,  the  retail  shops,  the 
official,  legal,  medical,  literary,  journalistic,  artistic,  and  gen- 
eral professional  society.  And  when  we  take  into  considera- 
tion all  these  things,  side  by  side  with  the  wide  commerce, 
increasing  population,  and  cosmopolitan  interests  of  England, 
we  see  at  once^  I  fancy,  why  London  is  bigger  than  Paris,  or 
Berlin,  or  New  York,  or  St.  Petersburg. 

From  The  Cornhill  Magazine . 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES. 

Time  was  in  literature,  when  there  were  no  dictionaries.  Of 
course,  letters  had  their  small  diffusion,  viva  voce.  The  few 
Sauls,  for  all  the  generations,  could  ask  the  ,  fewer  Gamaliels, 
on  the  quick  moment,  for  the  shoif  interpretation  that  should 
make  passages  in  their\)rnamented  or  antiquated  disquisitions 
clear ;  and  there  was  no  need  for  moxe.  By  the  lip  could  be 
solved  the  mystery  coming  from  the  lip ;  for  within  the  por- 
tico, in  the  cloister,  under  the  shade  there  on  the  hill,  the 
master  sat  in  the  midst  of  his  pupils,  and  the  lip  was  near. 

It  ended,  this.  Pupils,  when  knowledge  was  called  for  in 
distant  parts,  had  to  be  dispersed".  Each  stood  solitary  then, 
or  nearly  solitary,  separated  from  the  schools  whence  schol- 
arly help  could  be  drawn.     Yet  each  stood  facing  a  crowd 

ouped  round  him  to  be  taught;  and  each,  at  some  wor4«  at 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES.  59J 

some  clause,  at  some  peroration,  at  some  pregnant  comer- 
stone  of  an  argument  he  was  burning  to  launch  straight  home, 
found  the  text  of  his  parchment  a  pit,  or  a  stumbling-block, 
hindering  him.  The  treasured  MS.  was  of  his  own  copying, 
nearly  for  a  cert£^inty.  That  did  not  affect  the  case.  As  he 
read  from  it — spread  on  his  knee,  perhaps,  a  scroll ;  laid  open 
upon  a  desk,  leaved,  and  laboriously  and  delicately  margined, 
and  stitched  and  covered  and  clasped  into  the  form  of  a  goodly 
book — he  had  to  expound  its  learned  method  so  that  it  should 
touch  the  simple  ;  or,  bewildering  him  ^  sadly,  he  had  to  turn 
its  words  from  the  Greek,  from  the  Hebrew,  from  any  master- 
tongue,iinto  the  language,  even  the  dialect,  familiar  to  his 
audience — ^a  language  often  harshly  unfamiliar  to  himself — 
and  the  right  way  to  do  this  would  again  and  again  refuse  to 
come  to  hini,  and  his  message  failed.  There  was  the  pity  of 
it ;  there  was  the  grief.  It  could  not  be  allowed  to  abide. 
And  at  last  ther6  occurred  to  him  the  remedy.  In  his  quiet 
hours,  his  flock  away,  he  would  pore  over  his  MS.  afresh.  It 
might  be  missal,  it  might  be  commentary,  treatise,  diatribe, 
epic  poem,  homily.  Holy  Writ — the  same  plan  would  be  effi- 
cacious for  each  one.  After  beating  out  the  meaning  of  the 
crabbed,  the  Oriental,  characters-— of  the  painstaking,  level, 
faultless  Gothic  letter — he  would  write  this  meaning,  this 
exposition,  this  gloss,  above  each  word,  each  phrasing,  that 
had  given  him  trouble ;  and  then,  thenceforth,  and  forever, 
such  gloss  would  be  there  to  see  and  to  use,  and  Qv^ry  diffi- 
culty would  have  been  made,  magically,  to  disappear.  Good. 
The  goodness  must  be  manifest  at  once.  Only  there  is  a  fact 
remaining,  requiring  acute  indication.  At  the  veiy  first  word 
the  very  first  of  these  conscientious  old-world  scholars  thus 
glossed  or  explained,  the  seed  was  sown  of  the  new-world 
dictionaries;  and  there  has  been  no  stop  to  the  growth  of 
this  seed  till  the  tree  from  it  has  spread  its  thick  and  wide 
branches  as  far  as  they  have  spread,  and  are  still  spreading,  in 
this  very  to-day. 


594  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Perhaps  this  may  seem  remote.  Short  work  will  be  enough 
to  show  how  it  was  done.  Pupils,  or  calhthem  young  or  less- 
instructed  associates  of  a  master,  had  again,  and  after  a  lapse 
of  time  in  greater  numbers,  to  be  dispersed.  After  the  lapse 
of  time,  also,  MSS.  were  ordered  to  be  executed  for  royal  and 
other  wealthy  readers,  too  much  engrossed  by  state  and  duties 
to  be  able  to  keep  to  the  set  places  and  hours  of  a  class.  As 
for  the  yoang  associates,  they  would,  have  read  from  their 
master's  glossed  MSS.  during  their  pupilage,  had  they  had  to 
take  their  duties  whilst  they  were  absent,  whilst  they  were 
ill.  As  for  the  newly-finished  MSS.,  it  would  have  been  de- 
struction to  their  cherished  neatness,  to  their  skilled,  beauty, 
to  have  defaced  them  with  glosses  here  and  there,  as  glosses 
were,  in  patches,  and  generally,  for  greater  conspicuousness, 
written  in  red  letters.  Glossed  words  were  written  in  a  list 
apart,  then  ;  becoming,  in  this  way,  companion  to  the  student, 
enlightenment  to  the  MS.,  and  enlightenment  almost  as  handy 
as  if  it  had  been  delivered  from  the  tongue.  Particular  expo- 
sition of  a  particular  master  came  to  be  especially  demanded, 
too ;  from  veneration,  for  comparison,  to  settle  a  dispute,  for 
the  mere  admiration  and  interest  of  seeing  what  another  man 
had  done.  Such  exposition  was,  perforce,  on  a  separate  list. 
Such  expositions,  moreover — coming  as  they  did,  one  perhaps 
from  a  scholar  at  Rhegium,  one  from  Nysa,  one  from  Alexan- 
dria, Rome,  Constantinople,  Rhodes — could  be  readily  per- 
ceived to  possess  color  from  the  temperament,  from  the 
circumstances,  of  the  writer ;  and  it  followed  as  a  simple  con- 
sequence, that  two  or  more  should  be  set  out,  methodically, 
side  by  side.  Here,  then,  was  the  form  of  a  dictionary ;  the 
germ  of  it,  its  manner.  Here  a  word  stood,  with  a  series  of 
interpretations  to  it ;  the  whole  to  be  read  at  one  coi^lting,' 
and  giving  employment  to  the  critical  faculty  of  rejecftto  or 
approval.  For  this  duplication,  this  triplication,  this 
plication,  as  it  grew  to  be,  had  its  own  excellent  relish, 
the  very  relish  suggested  something  more.    There  would  lia.^v< 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  595 

been  the  word  exzlis,  put  it.  One  teacher  would  recommend 
it  to  be  rendered  thin  (of  course,  the  equivalent  to  these 
shades  or  thought,  according  to  the  tongue  being  used  and 
elucidated) ;  another  teacher,  of  wider  thought,  would  expound 
it  mean;  another,  living  ^midst  bleak  rocks,  perhaps,  and 
these  helping  his  asceticism,  would  set  ^o^nbarren;  another, 
applying  the  thinness  and  tenuity  to  some  musical  sound 
remaining  in  his  memory,  would  write  it  shrill,  treble.  To  say 
this,  is  but  to  say  how  language  itself  accumulated,  and  had 
expansion.  Yet  it  suggests  the  mode.  It  points  out  how, 
when  each  word  had  such  various  glosses  put  to  it,  richness 
could  not  fail  to  arise ;  and  diversity,  and  discrimination,  with 
greater  or  less  delicacy  of  expression  ;  and  how  glosses  being 
born — or,  christen  them  with  that  longer  name  of  glossaries^- 
were  never  likely  to  be  let  to  die. 

There  has  to  be  recollection,  however,  that,  as  these  glos- 
saries were  limited  to  gleanings  from  one  MS.,  or  to  glean- 
ings from  various  copies  of  the  same  one  MS.,  according  to 
what,  of  fresh  interpretation,  each  separate  owner  had 
glossed,  so  they  were  limited  to  explaining  one  author;  or  to 
explaining  such  limited  portion  of  one  author  as  one  MS. 
contained.  Thus  one  glosssary  would  elucidate  a  Gospel ; 
one,  a  set  of  Epistles ;  one,  a  Prophet ;  one,  Virgil,  Horace, 
Homer,  Euripides.  The  Epinal  Gloss  is  an  existing  example, 
luckily  for  the  literary  world,  of  such  an  accumulation.  In 
MS.  still,  it  is  still,  by  the  religious  treasuring  it  has  had  at 
Epinal,  precisely  as  it  was  at  its  compilation  1,200  years  ago 
(in  the  course  now,  however,  of  being  printed  here,  lent  by 
the  French  Government  for  that  purpose) ;  and  it  is  testi- 
mony* teeming  with  Interest,  of  how  far  Dictionary-life,  in  its 
da3%  had  advanced.  Progressing  still,  there  was  the  Latin 
Glossary  of  Varro,  dedicated  to  his  contemporary  Cicero. 
There  was  the  Lexicon  of  Apollonius  the  Sophist,  in  the  first 
^^V  century,  Elucidating  the  IHad  and  the  Odyssey.  There  was 
^^  aStthe  Onomasticon  of  Pollux ;  Pollux,  instructor  to  the  Em- 


596  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA GAZINE.  , 

peror  Com  modus,  having  produced  this,  a  Greek  Vocabulary, 
expressly  for  his  imperial  pupil's  use.  There  was  the  Lexicon 
of  Harpocration,  in  the  fourth  century,  relating  only  to  the 
Ten  Orators  of  Greece.  There  was  the  valuable  work  of 
Hesychius  of  Alexandria.  There  was  the  Glossary  of  Photius, 
written  in  the  ninth  century :  all  of  these  having  been  printed 
at  Venice  and  kindred  places,  after  centuries  of  chrysalis-life 
in  MS.,  almost  as  soon  as  printing  was  available;  and  this 
particular  Photian  Glossary  having  been  re-edited  here  by  Per- 
son, and  even  called  for,  after  Porson's  death,  later  still,  viz., 
in  1822.  There  was  the  Lexicon  of  Suidas,  collected  by  him  in 
the  tenth  century,  and  printed  at  Milan  in  1499 ;  remarkable 
for  the  plan,  first  used  in  it,  of  giving  extracts  from  the  poets 
and  historians  it  explained  to  explain  them  better,  and  for 
thus  widening  considerably  the  already  widening  field  of  the 
lexicographical  art.  There  was  the  dictionary,  in  the  thir- 
teenth century,  of  John  Balbus,  called  John  of  Genoa ;  a  Latin 
work  extending  to  700  pages  folio,  that  has  further  notability 
from  having  been  the  first  in  type,  Gutenberg  himself  having 
printed  it  at  Mayence,  in  1460.  There  was  the  dictionary^ 
printed  at  Vicenza  in  1483,  of  Johannes  Crestonus,  in  Greek  and 
Latin  ;  both,  also,  a  development.  There  was  the  Latin  dic- 
tionary of  Calepino,  first  printed  at  Reggio  in  1502,  and 
enjoying,  like  the  Greek  dictionary  of  Photius,  continued  re- 
editing  down  to  the  present  century.  But  the  expansion  of 
the  gloss-seed,  as  shown  in  all  these  instances,  having  reached 
the  point  at  which  there  was  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the 
search  for  words  was  a  distinct  branch  of  letters,  worthy  of  a 
special  hand  possessing  special  scholarly  attainments,  the 
period  of  English  dictionaries  has  been  touched,  and  the  sub- 
ject must  have  treatment  assuming  different  proportions. 

It  will  have  been  understood — up  to  this  point,  of  course — 
that  the  aim  of  all  the  early  word-works  that  have  been  enu- 
merated was  merely  to  give  explanations  of  rare  words,  diffi* 
cult  words  ;  words  known,  shojtly,  as  "  hard."    This  continued.  . 


.  AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES:  $97 

English  lexicographers,  at  this  outset  of  their  career,  and  for 
centuries,  did  not  go  beyond.  They  grew  very  pleasant,  they 
Were  quaint,  they  were  concentrated,  they  were  rambling, 
delightful,  either  way ;  and  they  shall  be  their  own  exempli- 
fication. 

The  Promptorium  Parvulorum  heads  the  list ;  the  Little 
Expeditor,  or  the  Little  Discloser,  as  it  might  (very  freely)  be 
translated.  Alas,  that  it  should  be  so  small!  That  "hard" 
words  were  so  scant  then,  it  has  such  few  pages  that  they  can 
be  run  through  in  a  moderate  reading.  Its  style  is  to  go  from 
A  to  Z  alphabetically,  but  to  have  its  nouns  in  one  list,  its 
verbs  in  another ;  to  give  nothing  but  these  nouns  and  verbs ; 
.  and,  being  written  in  English  first  to  fielp  English  students  to 
Latin,  it  has  no  complementary  half  for  those  who,  having  a 
Latin  word,  wanted  to  turn  it  into  English.  "  Gredynesse  of 
mete,"  it  says,  "  Aviditas. .  Gredynesse  in  askynge,  Procacitas- 
Fadyr  and  modyr  yn  one  worde.  Parens.  False  and  deceyva- 
ble  and  yvel  menynge,  Versutis,  Versipellis.  Golet  or  Throte,  • 
Guttar,  Gluma,  Gola.  Clepyn  or  Callyn,  Voco."  Its  date  is 
1440,  about;  it  was  written  by  a  Norfolk  man  (as  the  preface 
tells) ;  Richard  Francis,  think  some  ;  Galfridus  Grammaticus, 
as  is  conjectured  by  others;  it  was  first  printed  in  1499,  ap- 
peared three  or  four  times  again  when  1500  was  just  turned, 
and  has  had  a  careful  reprint  recently  by  the  Camden  Society, 
under  the  capable  editing  of  Mr.  Albert  Way.  Immediately 
succeeded,  this,  by  the  Catholicon  Anglicum,  dated  1483,  but 
never  in  print  till  the  Early  English  Text  Society  was  granted 
the  privilege  of  publishing  it  a  very  few  years  ago  ;  by  the 
Medulla  Grammatice ;  by  the  Ortus  Vocabulorum  based  upon 
it,  and  printed  in  1500  (these  being  Latin);  by  Palsgrave's 
Lesclaircissement  de  la  Langue  Francoyse,  printed  in  1 530 ; 
by  Wyllyam  Salesbury's  Dictionary  in  Englysche  and  Welshe, 
printed  in  1547 ;  there  came  the  English  dictionary  proper  of 
Richard  Huloet,  that  first  went  to  the  press  in  1552.  The 
edition  of  this  by  John  Higgins,  printed  a  few  years  later,  is  a 


598  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

volume  that  is  beautiful  even  by  the  standard  of  today.  It 
is  folio ;  generously  thick  ;  perfect  in  its  neatness ;  its  double 
columns  are  regularly  arranged,  with  the  headings  B  ante  A, 
B  ante  E  (the  fair  forerunner  of  the  present  mode  BAB,  BAC, 
etc.) ;  and,  intended  to  give  English  and  Latin  and  French,  it 
puts  the  English  in  black  letter,  the  Latin  in  Roman,  the 
French  in  italics ;  unless,  indeed,  the  French  is  evidently  not 
in  Richard  Huloet*s  knowledge,  when  Huloet  calmly  omits  it 
altogether.    Here  is  his  manner: — 

.  Apple,  called  Apple  John,  or  Saint  John*s  Apple,  or  a  sweting,  or  an  iapple  of  para- 
dise. Malum,  musteum,  MelineUim,  quod  minimum  durat  celeriter-que  mitescit. 
Pomme  dc  paradis. 

Here  again  \— 

Pickers,  or  thieves  that  go  by  into  chambers,  making  as  though  they  sought  some- 
thing.  Diaetarii.  Ulpian.  Larrons  qui  montent  jusques  aux  chambres,  faisant  sem^ 
blant  de  cercher  quelque  chose. 

"  For  the  better  attayning  of  the  knowledge  of  words,"  say^ 
this  good  Richard  Huloet,  "  I  went  not  to  the  common  dic- 
tionaries only,  but  also  to  the  authors  themselves.  .  .  .  and 
finally,  I  wrate  not  in  the  whole  booke  one  quyre  without 
perusing  and  conference  of  many  authors.  .  .  .  Wherefore, 
gentle  reader,  accept  my  paynes  as  thou  wouldest  others 
should  (in  like  case)  accept  thine." 

The  "Manrpulus  Vocabulorum,"  written  by  Peter  Leve'ns 
in  1570,  printed  then,  by  Henrie  Bynneman,  in  ^^  leaves 
quarto,  and  reprinted  a  few  years  since,  under  the  careful 
supervision  of  Mr.  H.  B.  Wheatley,  appeals  quite  as  prettily 
to  have  its  claims  considered.  "  Some  will  say,"  writes  Peter 
Levens,  "  that  it  is  a  superfluous  and  unnecessarie  labor  *to 
set  forth  this  Dictionarie,  for  so  muche  as  Maister  Huloet 
hath  sette  forthe  so  worthie  a  worke  of  the  same  kiude 
already.  But  ....  his  is  great  and  costly,  this  is  little  and  of 
light  price ;  his  for  greter  students  and  them  that  are  richable 
to  have  it,  this  for  beginners  and  them  that  are  pooreable  to 
have  no  better;  his  is  ful  of  phrases  and  sentences  fii&lor 

'\ 


.    AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES.  '   599 

them  that  use  oration  and  oratorie,  this  is  onely  stuffed  full 
of  words."  And  there  the  words  are :  in  English  first,  in 
Latin  after;  in  double  columns;  and  the  English  to  rhyme, 
**  for  Scholers  as  used  to  write  in  English  Meetre,"  thus: — 
Bande,  Brande,  Hande,  Lande,  Sande,  Strande,  etc.,  with  the 
Latin  for  each  at  the  side.  Over  the  errata  at  the  end  Peter 
Levins  writes,  "  Gentle  Reader,  amende  these  fautes  escaped  " ; 
and  the  only  wish  to  the  modern  reader  is  that  there  was  more 
matter  to  read,  even  if  it  enforced  the  amendment  of  fautes 
indeed. 

Contemporary  with  this,  was  a  "  Shorte  Dictionarie  in  Latin 
and  English  verie  profitable  for  yong  Beginners,"  by  J. 
Withals.  it  is  a  charming-looking  little  book,  octavo,  only 
half  an  inch  thick,  light  and  supple  as  a  pocket-book,  with  its 
matter  in  double  columns,  the  English  first,  and  the  "catch- 
words" of  this  still  in  black  letter.  Wynkyn  de  Worde 
printed  it  in  its  early  editions,  and  it  was  printed  again  and 
again  by  others,  down  to  1599.  "A  Little  Dictionarie  for 
Children,"  says  J.  Withals,  as  a  running  title  all  along  the 
pages  of  it;  but  he  gives  the  puzzled  little  Elizabethan  chil- 
dren no  alphabet  to  guide  them,  and  only  divides  his  articles 
into  what  appears  to  him  to  be  subjects.  "The  Times,"  he 
says,  as  a  promising  heading  to  one  of  these ;  then  under  it  he 
puts  such  odd  times  as  "  A  meete  tyme.  To  sit  a  sunning,  A 
fielde  beginning  to  spring,  A  fielde  beginning  to  wax  greene," 
and  so  forth.  In  "  Certaine  Phrases  for  Children  to  use  in  fa- 
miliar speeche,"  J.  Withals  is  as  quaint  to  the  very  end. 
"  Away  and  be  hanged  !  "  he  puts  ready  for  his  little  Tudor 
schoolboys,  rendering  it  "Abi  hinc  in  malam  rem."  And,  "  I 
am  scarselye  mine  owne  man,"  "  Vix  sum  apud  me."  "  Evans. 
What  is  fair,  William  ?  WilL  Pulcher.  Evans,  What  is  lapis, 
William  ?  Will.  A  stone.  Evans.  That  is  good,  William."  So 
it  is ;  and  in  J.  Withals  may  be  seen  the  very  manner  of  the 
acquisition  of  it. 

John  Baret,  in  1573,  most  fitly  joins  and  ornaments  this 


600  THE  LIBRARY  M^AGAZINE. 

group.  The  title  of  his  Dictionary  is  "  An  Alvearie  "  (a  bee- 
hive) ;  and  he,  in  a  manner  sets  out  the  development  of  the 
Gloss,  even  from  the  area  of  his  own  experience.  "  About 
eyghteen  years  agone,"  he  writes,  "  having  pupils  at  Cam- 
bridge studious  of  the  Latin  tongue/'  they  "  perceyving  what 
great  trouble  it  was  to  come  running  to  mee  for  every  word 
they  missed  ....  I  appoynted  them  .  .  .  every  day  to  write 
English  before  ye  Latin,  and  likewise  to  gather  a  number  of 
fine  phrases  out  of  Cicero,  Terence,  Caesar,  Livie,€tc.,  and  to 
set  them  under  severall  tytles,  for  the  more  ready  finding 
them  againe  at  their  neede  .  .  .  ."  when  as  "within  a  yeare  or 
two  they  had  gathered  togither  a  great  volume,"  he  called 
them  his  diligent  bees,  and  their  great  volume  an  alvfearie.  It  is 
curious,  this,  as  being  plain,  though  not  unexpected,  witness. 
So,  also,  does  John  Baret  throw  other  curious  light,  and  mark 
some  progress.     "A  Goast "  shows  his  method.    Thus — 

A  Ghoast,  an  image  in  raan*s  imagination.  Spectrum^  tri,  n.  g.,  Cic.  Pluuntasme, 
vision.     La  semblense  des  choses  que  nostre  pensee  ha  conceue  ; 

in  the  Latin  part  of  which  there  will  be  noted  the  first  ap- 
pearance of  a  declension  and  an  authority.  This  attractive 
work  began  by  being  a  triple  Dictionary — English,  Latin, 
French ;  and  in  later  editions  grew  to  a  quadruple  Diction- 
ary, with  Greek  added.  The  French,  however,  as  with  Rich- 
ard Huloet,  is  omitted  again  and  again ;  and  "  as  for  Greeke," 
says  John  Baret  himself,  "  I  coulde  not  ioyne  it  with  every 
Latin  word,  for  lacke  of  fit  Greeke  letters,  the  printer  not 
having  leasure  to  provide  the  same  ! "  And  it  is  a  confession 
far  too  pretty  not  to  have  this  small  resuscitation. 

By  these  examples,  French,  Latin,  Greek  are  proved  to  have 
been  imperative  to  the  home-life  of  (educated)  mediaevals ; 
and  "  neat  Italy " — for  all  that  Rome,  the  heart  of  it,  was 
somewhat  out  of  favor — was  not  to  be  unrepresented  by  the 
Dictionary-makers  under  Elizabeth.  John  Florio,  who  was 
English  except  by  extraction,  who  was  teacher  of  French  aQd 
Italian  at  Oxford,  and,  on  the  accession  of  James  the  First,  ap- 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  6oi 

pointed  tutor  to  the  poor  Prince  Henry,  his  son,  published 
-an  Italian  and  English  Dictionary  in  1 598.  Italian  first,  he 
put,  and  put  no  more ;  but  within  ten  years,  Giovanni  Tor- 
riano,  a  fellow-teacher  and  an  Italian,  in  London,  seeing  (it 
may  be  supposed)  the  value  of  Baret's  Latin  and  French  and 
Greek  lists — cumbrous  and  inefficient  as  they  were— provided 
Florio's  book  with  a  second  and  better  half,  viz.,  English  words 
first  and  Italian  after,  in  the  present  full  manner ;  thus  bring- 
ing bi-lingual  Dictionaries  up  to  a  standard  from  which,  to  be 
complete,  there  could  be  no  departing  any  more. 

"Lettere  di  scatola,"  says  John  Florio;  letting  him  speak 
for  himself,  "  or  Lettere  di  spetiale,  great  letters,  text  charac- 
ters, such  as  in  Apothecaries'  shops  are  written  on  their  boxes 
that  every  man  may  read  them  afar  off»  and  know  what  they 
contain :  Used  by  Metaphor  for  to  speak  plainly,  without 
fear."  Also,  John  Florio  gives  column  after  column  of  Italian 
proverbs,  of  which  here  are  two,  both  touching  his  craft : — 

Le  parole  non  s'infilzano— Words  do  not  thriddle  themselves. 

I  fatti  son  maschi,  le  parole  son  femine — Deeds  are  masculine,  words  are  women. 

A  splendid  volume  by  Cotgrave,  a  French  and  English  Dic- 
tionary, folio,  clean,  exact,  of  most  accurate  printing,  advanced 
to  the  three  index  letters  at  the  head  of  each  column,  in  the 
perfect  form  of  to-day,  was  published  in  161 1.  "A  Bundle  of 
Words,"  Cotgrave  calls  it,  in  a  fatherly,  fondling  way,  when 
asking  Lord  Burleigh, In  his  preface,  to  look  upon  it  with 
favor.  And  he  puts  his 'errata  at  the  very  beginning,  before 
ever  he  opens  his  bundle,  because  ^'  I  (who  am  no  God,  or 
angel)  have  caused  such  overslips  as  have  yet  occurred  to 
mine  eye  or  understanding,  to  be  placed  neere  the  forhead  of 
this  Verball  Creature."  The  novelty  in  this  "  Verball  Crea- 
ture," or  the  stride  made  by  it,  is  the  grammar  appended,  with 
the  French  verbs  conjugated  in  the  manner  still  used  to-day. 
Aller,  says  Cotgrave,  in  a  mode  bald  enough ;  but  his  English 
explanation  of  the  word  is  a  glory.  It  says,  "  To  goe,  to  walke, 
wend,  ttiarch,  pace,  tread,  proceed,  journey,  travell,  depart," 


6o2  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

with  forty  or  fifty  picturesque  illustrations,  5Uch  as^AUerd 
S.  Bczet,  To  rest  in  no  place,  continually  to  trot,  gad,  wander 
up  and  down ;  "such  as  " Tout  le  monde  s'en  va  a  la  moustarde 
—  'Tis  common  vulgar,  Divulged  all  the  world  over  (said  of  a 
booke),  waste  paper  is  made  of  it,  mustard  pots  are  stopped 
with  it  (so  much  the  world  esteems  it)."  This  is  a  small  sam- 
ple, but  it  shows,  amply,  that  the  '*  Verball  Creature  "it  is 
pulled  from  is  a  "  Bundle  of  Words  "  that  would  bear  much 
more  unpacking  and  much  more  close  overhauHng. 

Another  genuine  English  Dictionary  must  be  taken  from 
the  shelf  now.  It  could  scarcely  present  itself  in  more  entic- 
ing guise.  It  is  smaller  even  than  Withals's  Latin  and-Eng- 
lish  Dictionary  was ;  it  is  thinner,  narrower,  more  supple, 
more  suited  still  to  be  one  number  of  a  Portable  Library,  and 
the  one  never  likely  to  be  left  behind.  Being  English  ex- 
plaining English,  this  diminutive  size  seems  curious — until 
there  is  consideration,  It  is  that  "hard  "  English  words  even 
in  this  day  of  John  Bullokar,  the  author,  were  still  few ;  that 
John  Buljokar's  columns  and  pages  were  consequently  few, 
to  match.  "  I  open  the  significations  of  such  words  to  the 
capacitie  of  the  ignorant,"  he  writes,  writing  from  "  my 
house  at  Chichester  in  Sussex,  this  17  day  of  October,  1616." 
"  It  is  familiar  among  best  writers  to  usurp  strange  words  " 
now ;  yet  "  I  suppose  withali  their  desire  is  that  they  should 
also  be  understoode,  which  I  .  .  .  .  have  endeavored  by  this 
Booke,  though  not  exquisitely,  ....  to  perform."  Yet  it  is 
exquisitely  performed.  "A  Girl,"  says  the  performer — \i\ 
proof  of  his  exquisiteness — "  a  Roe  Bucke  of  two  yeares  " — 
for  he  is  far  too  earnest  in  his  desire  for  consistency  to  put 
any  explanation  to  Girl  except  that  which  is  very  *'  hard  " 
indeed.  "Have  a  care,"  he  says,  too,  warningly  (and  wam- 
ingly,  without  a  suspicion  of  it),  "  to  search  every  word  accord- 
ing to  the  true  Orthography  thereof  ;  as  for  Phoenix  in  the  let* 
ter  P,  not  F ;  for  Hypostaticall  in  Hy,  not  Hi."  And  he  g^ives 
a  note  of  Natural  History  (amidst  some  scores)  that  mt|St  be 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  ^^  >6o3 

turned  to  before  his  pages  are  closed  and  he  is  laid  aside.  A 
Crocodile,  he  says  (after  a  column  and  a  half  of  description  of 
it)  "  will  weepe  over  a  man's  head  when  he  hath  devoured  the 
body  and  then  wil  eate  up  the  head  two.  .  .  I  saw  once  one  of 
these  beasts  in  London,  brought  thither  dead,  but  in  perfect 
forme,  of  about  two  yards  long  ;  "  in  which  detail  of  personal 
experience  he  shows  what  was  tolerated,  and  even  expected,  in 
a  Dictionary  in  his  time ;  and  he  gives  what  is,  in  this  time,  a 
very  enriching  flavor. 

John  Minsheu,  first  publishing  in  1599,  but  appearing  in  his 
better  known  form  in  1617,  only  one  year  after  BuUokar,  must 
here  have  his  greeting.  "  Some  have  affirmed,"  he  says  cap- 
tivatingly,  at  thd  very  onset,  *'  that  a  Dictionarie  in  a  yeere 
might  be  gathered  compleet  enough.  I  answer  that  m  con- 
ceit it  may  be ; "  and,  conceit  being  far  away  enough  from  his 
own  composition,  his  answer  carries  with  it  every  satisfaction. 
So  does  his  Dictionary.  It  was,  again,  like  Cotgrave's,  and 
Florio's,  and  Baret's,  and  "Master  Huloet's,"  an  immense 
work  ;  folio.  It  marked  more  progress,  too.  It  was  the  first 
book  ever  published  in  England  that  appended  a  list  of  sub- 
scribers ;  and  in  matters  appertaining  solely  (as  the  foregoing 
does  not)  to  Dictionary-growth,  it  was  the  first  that  tried  to 
.fix  the  derivation  of  words :  that  aimed  at  regulating  their 
sounds  by  putting  accents;  that  gave  some  chapters  of  con- 
nected Familiar  Conversations,  or  scenes,  hoping  them  to  be 
"  profitable  to  the  learned  and  not  unpleasant  to  any  other 
reader." 

His  Dictionary  was,  mainly,  to  teach  Spanish  ;  the  edition 
of  1597  has  Spanish  first  (for  there  had  been  reasons,  for  a 
good  many  years  in  that  i6th  century,  why  Spanish  should 
want  compassing  by  the  English;  and  there  were  reasons 
under  James  the  First,  when  Minsheu  went  to  the  press  again, 
that  Spanish  should  be  still  well  in  courtly  memory) ;  so  Min- 
sheu says :  "  I  accent  every  word  in  the  whole  Dictionar)'-  to 
cause  the  learner  to  pronounce  it  right,  otherwise  when  he 


.6o4  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

speaketh  he  shall  not  be  understoode  of  the  naturall  Span- 
iard." "  Lunch,  or  great  piece,"  is  his  arrangement  in  his 
latter  half,  where  he  has  English  first,  "  vide  Zouja."  /'  A  mer- 
Maide,  vide  Serena/*  "  A  Taunting  Verse,  vide  Satyra."  "  A 
Tippling  Gossip,  vide  Bevedora."  This  vide  occurringf  at 
every  one  of  the  thousands  of  English  words,  without  the  art 
of  book-making  having  advanced  sufficiently  for  it  to  be  seen 
that  a  note  at  the  beginning  of  the  division  would  have  made 
such  trouble  and  cost  unnecessary. 

A  vastly  different  Dictionary  was  published  by  Henry  Cock- 
eram,  in  1623.  He  thought  that  "  Ladies  and  Gentlewomen, 
young  schollers,  clarkes,  merchants,  as  also  strangers  of  any  . 
nation,"  desirous  of  "  a  refined  and  elegant  speech,"  would 
like  an  " Alphabe'ticall  and  English  Expositor"  of  "vulgar 
Words,"  "  mocke  words,"  "  fustian  termes,"  "  ridiculously  used 
in  pur  language,"  so  that  they  might  look-  into  such  an  Ex- 
positor "  to  receive  the  exact  and  ample  word  to  expresse  ** 
what  they  required.  Accordingly,  he  tells  them  that  Rude  is 
vulgar,  and  Agresticall  the  choice  word  they  ought  to  use  for 
it,  or  Rusticall,  Immorigerous,  Rurall ;  also,  that  To  Weede  is 
vulgar,  and  .the  choice  word  To  Sarculate,  To  Diruncinate,  To 
Averuncate  ;  further,  that  to  speak  of  To  knocke  one's  legs  in 
going,  is  vulgar ;  it  should  be  called  choicely  To  Interfeere. 
He  puts  down  a  "  Glosse,  a  short  exposition  of  any  darke 
speech;"  he  makes  his  Glosse  in  the  shape  his  period  had 
worked  it  into,  an  Exposition  of  very  dark  speech  indeed. 
His  Natural  History  is  quite  on  a  level  with  what  he  had  seen 
in  Dictionaries  before.  "  The  Barbie,"  he  say^,  as  a  specimen,  - 
•*a  Fish  that  will  not  meddle  with  the  baite  untill  with  her 
taile  shee  have  unhooked  it  from  the  hooke." 

But  Thomas  Blount,  of  the  Inner  Temple,  barrister,  in  anoth- 
er little  octavo  published  in  1656,  elbows  this  Henry  Cockerani 
aside,  and  has  good  reason  for  clamoring  for  attention.  H6 
wrote  his  Dictionary,  he  said  ("  Glossographia "  in  the  title), 
"  for  all  such  as  desire  to  understand  what  they  read,"  and  to  - 


AMONXi  THE  DICTION4RJES,  60S 

save  others  from  being,  what  he  was,  "often  gravell'd."  He 
had  "  gained  a  reasonable  knowledge  in  the  Latin  and  French," 
he  declares,  "  and  had  a  smattering  of  Greek  and  other 
Tongues;"  uselessly,  evidently;  for  these  are  some  of  the 
words  he  says  are  those  that  '*  gravell'd  '*  him  : — Basha,  Ser- 
aglio, Turbant,  the  Salique  Law,  Daulphin,  Escurial,  Infan- 
ta, Sanbenito,  Consul,  Tribune,  Obelisk,  Vatican,  Dictator. 
"  Nay,"  he  breaks  out,  **  to  that  pass  have  we  now  arrived, 
that  in  London  many  of  the  tradesmen  have  new  dialects : 
the  Vintner  will  furnish  you  with  Alicant,  Tent,  Sherbet,  Cof- 
fee, Chocolate ;  the  Tayler  is  ready  to  make  you  a  CapK>uch, 
Rochet,  or  a  Cloke  of  Drap  de  Berry ;  the  Barber  will  mod- 
ify your  Beard  into  A  la  Manchini ;  the  Haberdasher  is  ready 
to  furnish  you  with  a  Cassok ;  the  Semptress  with  a  Crabbat 
and  a  Toyiet."  England  had  no  Protectorate  in  respect  of  its 
English  words,  then,  clearly — however  carefully  Cromwell 
might  have  been  guarding  English  rights;  and  Puritanism 
found  itself  without  a  moment  to  spare  to  set  a  purist  at  the 
liead  of  language. 

Thomas  Blount,  however,  has  another  claim,  in  dictionary 
history,  for  distinct  mention.  When  his  "  Glossographia  " 
was  only  two  years  old,  namely  in  1658,  he  received  deep 
offense.  Edward  Phillips,  the  son  of  Anne  Milton,  Milton's 
sister,  publishing  a  folio  dictionary,  the  "New  World  of 
Words,"  made  Blount  bring  up  his  guns  to  try  and  shiver  it 
to  pieces,  thereby  ushering  warfare  into  lexicography ;  and, 
giving  such  Jife  to  it,  it  has  broken  out,  on  one  score  or 
afiother,  at  the  publication  of  almost  every  dictionary  since. 
Phillips  copied  out  of  Blount's  little  octavo  wholesale ;  copy- 
ing blunders  and  all,  even  to  blunders  of  type,  so  that  he  stood 
there  (in  sheets,  but  not  penitent)  convicted.  Many  errors  he 
made  without  copying,  too ;  and  simply  for  want  of  under- 
standing ;  and  for  these,  as  well  as  the  others,  Blount  pounces 
down  upon  him  vigorously— Blount  with  all  his  quills  high. 
He  says,  quoting  Phillips,  "  Gallon  (Spanish),  a  measure  con- 


6o6  '  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,    . 

taining  two  quarts.  Our  author  had  better  omitted  this  word, 
since  every  alewife  can  contradict^  him."  He  says,  quoting 
Phillips  still,  "Quaver,  a  measure  of  time  in  musick,  being 
the  half  of  a  crotchet,  as  a  crochet  the  half  of  a  quaver,  a 
semiquaver,  etc.  What  fustian  is  here  1  Just  so,  two  is  the 
half  of  four,  and  four  the  half  of  two ;  and  semiquaver  is 
explicated  by  a  dumb,  etc  ! "  This  suffices ;  anger  not  being  a 
pleasing  spectacle,-  nor  inefficiency  either.  Besides  Phillips 
acquired  wisdom  enough  to  correct  his  errors — ^about  forty 
years  after  he  had  made  them,  and  when  poor  Blount  was  dead ! 
' — and,  as  he  did  do  this,  it  is  but  mercy  now  to — shut  him  up, 
and  put  him  by. 

Echoing  about  still,  however,  are  adverse  criticisms  of  this 
unpleasing  roundhead,  as  another  volume  is  taken  down. 
"  Phillips  had  neither  skill,  tools,  nor  materials,"  said  the 
anonymous  author  of  the  "  Glossographia  Anglican  Nova," 
publishing  it  in  1707.  It  is  not  \i\s>  book,  however,  on  which 
the  fingers  fall.  Space  is  getting  miserably  shoi^t;  there  are 
nearly  two  centuries  of  dictionaries  yet  to  be  accounted  for ; 
in  the  throng,  many  a  CoHq,  a  quarto,  an  octavo  must  bej  passed 
untouched,  and  even  unnamed,  by ;  and  this  is  one  of  them. 
Here  is  the  bulky  folio,  though,  the  valuable  folio,  of  Dr. 
Stephen  Skinner;  published  in  167 1,  before  Phillips  had  put 
on  his  sackcloth,  and  when  Skinner,  too,  was  indorsing  the 
verdict  that  he  ought  to  wear  it.  This  must  be  handled  for  a 
moment,  and  have  a  little  open  spreading.  It  is  a  laborious 
etymological  dictionary;  large  as  full,  full  as  large;  it  con- 
tains elaborate  explanations  of  English  words  in  Latin ;  it 
contains  the  etymologies  of  these  words  from  the  Latin,  Greek, 
French,  Anglo-Saxon,  Italian,  Spanish,  Teutonic  ;  with  Min- 
sheu's  derivations,  and  Spelman's  derivations  (as  far  as  they 
existed),  to  compare ;  and  it  forms  a  whole  that  is  a  wonder, 
especially  when  it  is  considered  that  the  authpr  was  in  full 
practice  in  London  as  a  physician,  and  died  at  the  early  j 
of  forty-four.    His  manner  was  this: — 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  607 

-Platter :  I.  Fr.  Plat ;  Hisp.  Plato ;'  It.  Piatto,  Piatta ;  Teut.  Platte  ;  Ik  Lat.  Patina ; 
Gr.  .  .  .  . 

omitted  here,  say, "  for  lacke  of  fit  Greek  letters,  the  printer  not 
having  leasure,"  etc. ;  and  omitting,  likewise  a  long  definition 
of  what  a  plate  is  in  Latin — the  real  language  of  the  book.  It 
^vas  quite  concise;  quite  unornamented  and  undescanted 
upon;  just  brief  and  sheer,  straight  up  to  the  point;  and  it 
-was  precisely  because  it  was  this,  that  it  had  such  value.  Espe- 
cial literary  interest,  moreover,  will  never  fade  away  from  it.  It 
was  with  Johnson  in  that  lodging  in  Holborn,  in  that  "  hand- 
some house  in  ^ough  Square;  Fleet  Street,"  in  that  *'  upper 
room  fitted  up  like  a  counting-house  "  where  he  and  his  six 
copyists  spent  those  nme  years  engaged  upon  his  dictionary  ; 
and  nothing,  up  to  that  date,  was  in  existence  so  suited  to  the 
purpose.  In  company  with  the  "  Etymoligicon  Anglicanum" 
of  Junius,  it  gave  Johnson  his  etymologies  ready  to  his  hand, 
and  saved  him  several  years  of  unpalatable  labor. 

Nathan  Bailey,  appearing  in  1721,  was  a  fixed  auxiliary  to 
Skinner,  and  has  claims  to  notice  yet. more  pressing.  Reach- 
ing him  (and  skipping  Coles,  and  Cocker,  and  Kersey,  to  do  it 
— the  which  skipping  is  done  ruefully,  because  of  the  rich 
provender  they  almost  beg  to  be  cropped  away  from  them) — 
there  can  be  a  glance  at  once  at  Bailey's  title.  The  "  Univer- 
sal Etymological  English  Dictionary,"  it  is ;  and  in  that  word 
"  Universal  "  is  the  sign  that  distinguishes  it.  Nathan  Bailey 
had  the  genius  to  see  that  an  art  is  no  art  that  does  not  take 
in  all  sides  of  it ;  that  in^is  art  there  ought  to  be  a  represen- 
tatiopof  all  words — easy,  as  well  as  "  hard  " ;  "  fustian,"  as  well 
as  euphuistic  ;  current,  as  well  as  those  out  of  date,  and  being 
the  first  lexicographer  who  saw  this,  he  was  the  first  lexicogra- 
pher to  try  and  carry  it  out.  His  success  was  immense,  and  im- 
mediate. There  were  five  editions  of  him ;  there  were  ten  edi- 
tions of  him ;  there  were  fifteen ;  there  were  twenty ;  there  were 
twenty-four.  There  were  varieties  of  him,  and  many  editions  of 
each.    At  first  he  was  octavo  (but  as  broad  in  the  back  as  he 


t 


6o8  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

ought  to  be),  with  wood-cuts — in  which  idea,  also,  he  was  an  In- 
novator— to  show  matter,  such  as  heraldic  coats,  difficult  to  ex- 
plain ;  then  he  was  without  the  cuts,  at  the  lowered  price  of  6s. ; 
then  he  was  in  folio,  in  which  commodious  size  he  was  the  best 
help  Johnson  had  of  any.  Having  a  folio  copy  interleaved, 
Johnson's  notes  were  made  on  the  blank  sheets ;  and  it  stood,  a 
secure  and  acknowledged  foundation.  The  manner  of  Bailey, 
as  shown  in  his  work,  overruns  with  character.  "  A  cat  may 
look  at  a  king,"  he  says,  in  black  letters :  proverbs  being  a 
part  of  his  scheme,  ar^d  his  heart  full  in  it :  "  This  is  a  saucy 
proverb,  generally  made  use  of  by  pragmatical  persons,  who 
must  needs  be  censuring  their  superiors,  take  things  by  the 
worst  handle,  and  carry  them  beyond  their  bounds;  for 
though  peasants  may  look  at  and  honor  great  men,  patriots,  and 
potentates,  yet  they  are  not  to  spit  in  their  faces."  "Sea- 
Unicorn,  Unicorn-Whale,"  he  says,  in  delightful  continuation 
of  his  predecessors*  Natural  History;  he  being  a  thriving 
schoolmaster,  and  teaching  only  150  years  ago,  let  it  be 
hinted :  ".  A  Fish  eighteen  foot  long,  having  a  head  like  a 
horse,  and  scales  as  big  as  a  crown-piece,  six  large  fins  like 
the  end  of  a  galley-oar,  and  a  horn  issuing  out  of  the  forehead 
nine  foot  long,  so  sharp  as  to  pierce  the  hardest  bodies."  Can 
it  not  be  seen  how  ignorance  at  home  ought  not  to  be  sur- 
prising, and  how,  when  the  schoolmaster  went  abroad,  there 
was  plenty  for  him  to  put  down  in  his  note-book  ? 

And  now,  is  there  to  be  anything  of  Johnson  ?  What  has 
been  said,  has  been  said  with  little  skill,  if  there  is  not  clear 
understanding  b}''  now  that  he  was,  glaringly,  wanted.  Bailey 
was  the  standard,  there  must  be  firm  recollection,  and  re- 
mained standard  for  thirty  years.  There  was  Dyche  trying 
to  run  level  paces  with  him,  and  a  B.  N.  Defoe,  and  Sparrow, 
and  Martin,  and  two  or  three  known  only  by  the  name  of 
their  publishers — ^to  have  nothing  here  but  this  short  enum- 
eration there  was  even  John  Wesley.  John  Wesley's  ideas  of 
a  Dictionary  were  such  that  he  had  the  modesty  to  place  hiod* 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,        .  609 

self  only  in  duodecimo  ;  only  in  a  hundred  pages;  only  with 
one  column  to  a  page ;  with  which  circumstances.  John 
Wesley's  modesty  ended.  "  The  author  assures  you,"  he 
*brags, "  he  thinks  this  the  best  English  Dictionary  in  the 
world  " ;  and  the  sleek  conceit  of  him  (lexicographically) 
would  almost  show  cause  why  he  should  not  have  place  in 
serious  business  at  all.  "  Many  are  the  mistakes  in  all  the 
other  English  Dictionaries  which  I  have  yet  seen,"  he  adds, 
•*  whereas  I  can  truly  say  I  know  of  none  of  this  " ;  and  as  he 
has  thus  pointed  his  finger  at  "  mistakes  " — at  ignorance,  his 
pointing  is  his  passport,  even  if  there  were  nothing  more  in 
it  than  the  delicious  manner  in  which  it  is  done.  But  there  is 
far  more  in  it.  For  science  was  awakening,  when  Wesley 
was  preaching — and  writing  a  Dictionary.  Cook  was  circum- 
navigating the  globe  ;  Banks  was  laboring  at  his  botany ; 
Solander  was  with  them  ;  philosophy,  on  every  hand,  was 
drawing  her  robes  around  her,  and  taking  philosophic  shap- 
ing. With  specimens,  human  and  brute,  being  brought  home 
from  voyages  triumphantly  achieved,  with  drawings  and 
measurements  to  show  other  objects  not  so  conveniently 
preserved,  it  would  no  longer  do  to  have  Dictionaries,  or  say, 
Verbal  Creatures,  stuffed  full  of  fins  like  galley-oars,  of  croc- 
odiles' tears.  Ignorant  men,  consulting  these,  became  more 
Ignorant;  scientific  men,  consulting  them,  could  only  turn 
from  the  columns  and  give — according  to  their  temper — a 
laugh  or  a  sneer.  So  Johnson  had  to  be  set  to  work.  He 
was  a  scholar;  he  was  an  academic ;  he  was  a  man  of  letters. 
His  pen  could  run — circuitously,  it  is  true,  with  overmuch  of 
pomp  ;  but  the  bound  of  it  had  vigor ;  its  stateliness  had 
caught  the  public  eye.  And  a  little  knot  ot  publishers, 
Acutely  seeing  the  commercial  side  of  this,  had  interviews 
with  him.  negotiated  with  him,  let  him  know  that  he  was  the 
man.  Poor  Johnson!  He  had,  he  says  in  his  preface,  "the 
dreams  of  a  poet  " ;  he  was  "  doomed  at  last  to  wake  a  lexicog- 
rapher " !  He  wrote,  having  "  little  assistance  of  the  learned. 
L.  M. — 20 


6l O  •         THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

and  without  any  patronage  of  the  great;  pot-in  the  soft  ob-' 
scurities  of  retirement  or  under  the  shelter  of  academic 
bowers,  but  amidst  inconvenience  and  distraction,  in  sickness 
and  in  sorrow."  Yes.  His  "  Tetty  "  died  during  the  nine  years 
his  Dictionary  occupied  him ;  he  was  not  able  during  the  nine 
years  to  remain  in  one  home.  He  had  to  leave  that  lodging 
in  Holborn,  where  he  aad  six  copyists  sat  in  an  upper  cham- 
ber fitted  up  like  a  counting-house ;  he  had  to  get  another 
lodging  in  Gough  Square.  Worse  than  all,  he  "  soon  dis- 
covered that  the  bulk  of  my  volumes  would  fright  away  the 
student ;  thus  to  the  weariness  of  copying  I  was  condemned 
to  add  the  vexation  of  expunging";  and  "I  have  not  always 
executed  my  own  scheme,  or  satisfied  my  own  expectations  *' ; 
and  he  had  to  collect  materials  by  "  fortuitous  and  unguided 
excursions  into  books,"  out  of  "  the  boundless  chaos  of  living 
speech  " ;  and  he  knew  that  **  among  unhappy  mortals  is  the 
writer  of  Dictionaries,  the  slave  of  science,  doomed  only  to 
remove  rubbish,"  and  that,  though  "every  other  author  may 
aspire  to  praise,  the  lexicographer  caii  only  hope  to  escape 
reproach"!  Yes.  And  let  the  sigh  come  out  again,  Poor 
Johnson  !  "  Lexicographer,"  he  writes,  when  he  has  worked 
up  to  that  word  in  his  two  giant  volumes — ^that  are  half  a  yard 
high,  that  are  nearly  a  foot  wide,  that  are  nearly  a  finger 
thick,  that  weigh  pounds  and  pounds — "  Lexicographer  " ; 
and  he  puts  to  it  the  celebrated  definition,  "A  writer  of  dic- 
tionaries; a  harmless  drudge  that  busies  himself  in  tracing- 
the  original,  and  detailing  the  significance  of  words."  And 
can  it  cause  wonder?  Leaving  that,  however,  which  was  per- 
sonal to  Johnson,  let  notice  be  taken  solely  to  Johnson's 
work.  Attention  must  be  called  to  that  spelling  of  "diction- 
ories."  It  is  an  error  crept  in.  It  is  an  earnest  of  a  thousand 
errors — and  weaknesses,  and  omissions,  and  false  notions, 
and  unnecessary  verbiage,  and  failure  to  hit — that  also  crept 
in,  in  spite  of  all  the  learning  of  Johnson,  and  all  his  researclv 
nd  all  his  exhausting  care.    Able  as  he  was,  concentrated  u 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  6ll 

he  could  make  himself,  he  could  only  go  as  far  as  the  knowl- 
edge of  his  day  had  gone;  he  could  only  see  as  far  as  his 
human  eyes  would  let  him  see.  So  he  omits  predilection,  re- 
spectJible,  bulky,  minetic,  isolated,  mimical,  decompose,  etc., 
of  accident ;  he  shall  not  put  in,  he  says  of  purpose,  such 
words  as  Socinian,  Calvinist,  Mahometan  ;  as  greenish,  and 
the  family  of  ish  ;  as  vileness,  or  any  ending  in  ness  ;  as  dully, 
or  any  ending  in  ly  ;  such  are  not  wanted.  John  Ash,  a  close 
successor  of  his,  and  a  very  blundering  copyer,  as  Phillips 
was  of  Blount,  is  received  as  a  lexicographical  joke  always, 
because,  whilst  writing  such  things  as  *'  bihovac,  rather  an 
incorrect  spelling  for  biovac,"  and  for  not  givingthe  right 
word,  bivouac,  at  all,  he  puts  down  "  esoteric  (adj.),  an  incor- 
rect spelling  for  exoteric,  which  see."  But  Johnson  had  not 
esoteric  or  exorteric,  either.  Science  had  not  advanced  suffi- 
ciently to  make  those  words  required  for  her  vocabulary ;  or 
else  he  forgot  them.  Johnson  thought,  also,  it  was  philology 
to  write  down  ^"exciseman,  from  excise  and  man";  and 
"  feather-bed,  from  feather  and  bed  " ;  and  "  looking-glass, 
from  look  and  glass,"  and  so  forth.  It  seemed  expedfent  to 
him,  too,  as  an  example,  to  say  of  network  (after  philologizing 
it  very  helpfully,  from  net  and  work),  "anything  reticulated 
or  decussated  at  equal  distances,  with  interstices  between  the 
intersections."  It  never  occurred  to  him  that  retitulate  and 
decussate,  and  interstice  and  intersection,  would  each  one  re- 
quire as  much  searching  for  as  netwofk,  and,  being  four 
words  for  one,  would  give  four  times  the  trouble.  Then  there 
was  that  class  of  definitions  he  would  never  consent  to  have 
expunged,  of  which  excise  is  a  well-known  illustration. 
"Excise,"  he  wrote,  "a  hateful  tax  levied  upon  commodities, 
and  adjudged  not  by  the  common  judges  of  property,  but 
wretches  hired  by  those  to  whom  excise  is  paid."  After  re- 
marking which,  Johnson's  immen>e  work,  laden  to  the  mar- 
gins with  its  glorious  quotations,  has  also  to  be  hoisted  up  on 
to  the  shelf— taking  a  heavy  lurch  to  do  it, — and  Johnson' 
work  has,  very  reluctantl5^  to  be  let  go. 


6l2  '    THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

He  had  successors  of  all  sorts,  in  shoals,  they  have  coanted 
20,-40,  60,  80,  100,  and  more.    There  was  Bu.chanan — to  touch 
one  or  two  of  the  most  notable,  here  and  there.    There  was 
Johnston,  particular  in  his  pronunciation,  and  getting  (for 
one)  Sirrah  pronounced  Serra,  whilst  his  contemporaries  in- 
sisted it  should  be  Sarra.    There  was  Kenrick,  the  originator 
of  the  London  Review,  and  the  libeller  of  Garrick.    There 
was   Entick.    There  was   Perry;    There  was   Nares.    There 
was  Sheridan,  telling  his  public  to  say  Wen'z-da,  and  Skee-i, 
and  Skee-i-lark,  and  Ghee-arden,  and  Ghee-ide,  and  so  on  ;  he 
being  sure  of  his  position  because  he  had  read  three  or  four 
hours  a  day  to  Swift,  had  heard  Chesterfieid"and  the  Duke  of 
Dorset  speak,  and  knew  pronunciation  had  been  uniform  in  the 
time  of  Queen  Anne,  and  had  only  been_defaced  by  ''the  ad- 
vent of  a  foreign  family,"  viz.,  of  course,  the  Hanoverian  line. 
There  was  Walker,  saying  (on  Sheridan's  report),  how  Swift 
used  to  jeer  the  people  who  called  the  wind  winn'd,  by  "  I 
have  a  great  minn'd  to  finn'd  why  you  pronounce  it  winn'd." 
and  how  he  was  met  by  the  retort,  "  If  I  may.be  so  boold,  I 
should   be  glad  to  be  toold  why  you  pronounce  it  goold." 
There  was   Scott.    There  was  George  Mason,  raving  about 
Johnson's  "  uniform  monotony  of  bombast ; "  his  "  ridiculous 
blunders  "  exceeding  4,300 ;  his  "  numberless  literary  transgres- 
sions" ;  his  "culpable  omissions"  ;  with  his  own  splendid  re- 
nunciation, on  his  own  part,  of  the  wish  to  "  plunder  poor 
Johnson  of  his  multifarious  literary  infamy  "  ;  with  his  ugly 
.little  phrase  that  "the  Rambler  in  an  article  I  should  be  most 
ashamed  to  own  the  penning  of."    There  was  Jodrell.    There 
was  Richardson,  proclaiming  Johnson's  Dictionary  "a  failure, 
his  first  conceptions  not  commensurate  to  his  task,  and  his 
subsequent  performance  not  even  approaching  the  measure 
of  his  original  design  "  ;   proclaiming  himself — no  ! — S2^fmg, 
"  he  may  be  arrainged  for  a  vainglorious  estimate  of  himsetSl 
whilst  it  is  quite  clear  he  thinks  too  glorious  an  estimat? 
every  way  impossible.    There  was  Todd.    There  were  Web- 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES.  "^61 3 

ster  and  Worcester;  American,  both;  remarkable,  in  their 
early  days,  for  so  much  quarreling,  that  a  hillock  of  pam- 
phlets carried  on  the  strife  for  months,  setting  down  testi- 
monials, anti-testimonials,  advertisements,  amounts  of  sales, 
narratives,  etc. ;  and  give  opportunity  to  Dr.  Worcester  to  say 
of  some  of  Dr.  Webster's  words,  **  it  has  been  my  intention 
scrupulously  to  avoid  them.  .  .  .  You  coined  them,  or  stamped 
them  anew,  to  enrich  or  embellish  the  language.  .  .  .  They 
are  Ammony,  Bridegoom,  Canail,  Leland,  Naivty,  Nightman 
Prosopopy  "  (and  more).  .  .  .  "  I  am  willing  that  you  should 
for  ever  have  the  entire  and  exclusive  possession  of  them." 

This  is  enough.  There  is  conception  by  now,  perhaps,  of 
the  mass  of  Dictionaries  there  is  for  the  student  to  roam 
amongst ;  and  the  giddy  bewilderment  likely  to  come  from 
the  consultation  of  column  after  column  of  them,  of  page 
after  page,  of  author  after  author  pressing  into  notice  by  the 
lively  score.  It  shall  be  concluded  that  this  is  so.  What, 
then,  will  be  the  giddiness  of  bewilderment  when  there  is  the 
announcement,  now,  by  way  of  conclusion,  that  there  is  no 
Dictionary  of  the  English  language  in  existence  as  yet  at  all  ? 
It  will  sound  prodigious ;  it  will  sound  stupendous ;  it  will 
sound  of  the  sort  that  will  entail  a  reference  to  a  Dictionary 
at  once  (any  one  will  do ;  that  one  nearest  at  hand)  to  try 
and  select  a  word  that  shall  fitly  express  absurdity  or  the 
wildest  intrepidity.  Yet  this  will  only  be — until  there  is  con- 
sideration. What — ^as  a  beginning  of  such  consideration — 
have  all  these  Dictionaries,  into  which  there  has  been  a  peep, 
amounted  to  ?  There  has  been  ignorance,  in  many,  when  they 
are  touched  on  the  score  of  utility  (their  raison  d'etre),  not 
charm  of  reading;  there  has  been  superfluousness ,  there  has 
been  folly ;  there  have  been  errors  and  omissions,  and  pla- 
giarisms, and  personal  warpings,  and  irrelevant  detail,  that 
make  up  as  curious  a  chapter  in  literary  history  as  is  any- 
where to  be  found.  And  what,  on  the  other  hand — ^to  con- 
sider more — is  it  clear  by  now  what  a  Dictionary  ought  to  be  ? 


V 


^h"  the  library  magazine. 

The  Philological  Society,  at  the  instiga^tion  of  Archbishop 
(then  Dean)  Trench,  so  long  ago  as  1857,  essayed  to  ans\ver 
this  question.  Its  members  decided  to  sound,  and  dig,  to  lay 
deep  and  sure  foundations,  for  a  Dictionarj'^  that  should  in- 
clude all  English  words,  in  all  centuries,  in  all  meanings,  with 
a  quotation  to  support  each  of  these  in  each  and  every  stage 
— a  quotation,  moreover,  with  book,  chapter,  and  verse  ap- 
pended, that  it  might,  for  all  time,  be  open  to  verification. 
They  called  upon  all  lovers  of  the  English  language  to  aid 
them  in  collecting  these  quotations  from  all  English  books.* 
They  appealed  to  all  who  were  competent,  and  who  felt  the 
impulse  to  be  more  than  mere  collectors,  to  aid  them  in 
arranging  these  countless  quotations ;  in  combining  them 
into  word  groups,  and  special  sense  groups,  and  chronological 
series,  ready  for  an  editor's  manipulation.  Then  they  saw 
that  an  editor,  like  a  master  architect,  could  build  upon  this 
broad  and  enduring  foundation ;  could  combi;ie  and  harmon- 
ize, and  complete  all  these  conspiring  efforts;  could  rear 
aloft  upon  them  at  length  the  fair  fabric  of.  the  Dictionary  that 
ought  to  be.  It  was  a  proud  scheme.  It  would  result  in  a 
complete  history  of  each  word,  it  was  seen — ^and  intended. 
The  birth  should  be  shown,  the  growth,  the  death — where 
death  had  come.  Clearly,  up  to  the  date  of  the  publication 
of  such  a  Dictionary,  the  English  language,  without  bias, 
would  have  representation  through  and  through;  also, after 
the  date  of  such  a  publication,  the  further  additions  of  further 
centuries  to. the  English  language  would  only  need  interpola- 
tion, in  edition  after  edition,  to  let  the  complete  representa- 
tion evermore  go  on.  But  adverse  circumstances  arose:  the 
first  nominated  editor — enthusiastic,  brilliant,  lovable — Her- 
bert Coleridge,  died.  The  shock  to  the  nascent  Dictionary 
was  sharp  and  severe  ;  and  though  Mr.  Furnivall,  zealous  in 
forming  the  Early  English  Text  Society,  the  Chaucer  and 
other  societies — founding  them  chiefly  that, the  welfare  of  the 
Dictionary  might  be  promoted — did  all  that  was  in  his  power 


AMONG  THE  DICTIONARIES,  615 

• 
to  ke,ep  the  work  heartily  in  hand,  there  came  a  chill  to  the 
warm  spread  of  it  and  it  almost  burnt  down.  Happily  this 
depression  is  past.  It  was  only  momentary,  to  lead  to  better 
energy  and  better  consolidation  ;  it  was  only  till  there  had 
been  sufficient  recovery  to  look  at  the  undertaking  anew;  and 
now  that  the  Philological  Society  has  secured  the  acceptance 
of  its  plan  by  the  University  of  Oxford — has  secured  its  exe- 
cution at  the  cost  and  with  the  typographical  resources  of  the 
University  press — now  that,  in  its  late  president,  Dr.  Murray, 
it  possesses  once  more  a  master-builder  especially  competent 
to  the  mighty  task,  and  willing  to  give  his  life  to  its  comple- 
tion, there  can  be  no  possible  fear  felt  as  to  the  result.  At 
his  call  8o3  volunteers  have  united  their  efforts  to  complete 
the  gleaning  and  garnering  in  of  quotations  ;  at  his  call  twenty 
scholars  are  lending  their  aid  to  rough-hew  these  into  pre- 
paratory form,  twenty  more  have  placed  their  special  knowl- 
edge at  his  service,  in  case  of  special  need.  The  right  spirit 
is  in  this  method  of  attacking  the  subject,  clearly.  As  a  re- 
sult, as  much  as  two-thirds  of  the  preliminary  labor  is  an- 
nounced as  done.  Further,  twelve  months  hence  Dr.  Murray 
is  in  full  hope  that  he  will  be  able  to  present  the  first-fruits 
of  work  the  seed  of  which,  as  has  been  seen,  was  sown  a  quar- 
ter of  a  century  ago.  And  though  all  this,  possibly,  is  too 
well  known  in  literary  circles,  is  attracting  too  much  literary 
interest,  to  have  made  any  reference  necessary  to  it  here, 
yet  whilst  among  the  Dictionaries,  it  would  have  been  gauche 
— it  would  have  been  ungrateful — to  have  left  it  out. 

From  The  Cornhill  Magazine. 


WILLIAM  BLAKE. 

A  strange  and  difficult  life,  and  the  production  of  much  art- 
work in  poelry  and  painting  of  which  the  merit  has  been 
fiercely  debated,  give  interest  of  a  peculiar  kind  to  the  story 
of  William  Blake.     Pictor  Ignotus  he  was  styled  years  ago. 


6l6  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and  to  a  portion  of  the  public  an  unknown  painter  he  still  re- 
mains. Probably  the  amount  of  uncouth  design  of  which  he 
must  perforce  be  accused,  and  the  volume  of  incomprehensi- 
ble verse  in  which  he  expressed  a  part  of  his  aspirations,  have 
largely  contributed  to  delay  the  universal  admission  of  suc- 
cess to  the  designs  which  are  not  uncouth  and  the  verse 
which  is  not  incomprehensible.  The  debate  about  the  merits 
of  William  Blake  has  never  been  of  a  satisfactory  kind.  Some 
people  have  been  too  enthusiastic,  and  many  have  been  too 
ignorant.  We  ow^e  much,  however,  to  the  late  Mr.  Gilchrist, 
to  Mr.  Rossetti,  Mr.  Swinburne,  and  one  or  two  writers  who 
have  yet  more  lately  expressed  themselves.  None  of  these 
gentlemen  are  to  be  charged  with  the  worst  exaggerations. 
All  are  patient  and  sympathetic  students  to  whom  Blake's 
genius  has  opened  itself — Mr.  Gilchrist  undoubtedly  foremost 
among  them,  and  always  the  chief.  And  indeed  there  are 
few  persons  who  can  take  up  the  study  of  Blake — his  life  and 
hfs  poetry  still  more  than  his  design — without  submitting  in 
some  sort  to  a  spell,  a  fascination,  such  as  Blake  personally 
exercised  upon  the  best  of  those  who  came  near  to  him  in  the 
flesh.  Probably  the  strongest  proof  of  Blake's  genius — des- 
pite his  many  deficiencies  and  his  occasional  wildness — is 
to  be  found  in  the  inevitableness  of  the  charm  he  exercises 
over  all  minds  that  are  not  quite  hopelessly  commonplace. 
To  know  Blake  isto  be  glad  to  be  with  him.  To  know  a  lit- 
tle of  his  designs  and  nothing  of  his  life  and  of  his  poetry,  may 
perhaps  be  to  deride  and  undervalue  him.  But  a  more  com- 
plete knowledge  of  him,  and  of  the  various  ways  in  which  his 
spirit  was  manifested,  brings  about  the  rare  joy  that  it  is 
proper  to  feel  in  presence  of  a  sweet  nature  and  of  a  high 
mind. 

The  essential  unworldliness  of  Blake  is  one  of  the  most  in- 
teresting of  his  characteristics  ;  he  was  unworldly,  not  in  the 
sense  of  the  theologian  who  is  more  occupied  with  points  of 
doctrine  than  with  the  facts  of  life,  but  as  one  upon  whom 


WILLIAM  BLAKE.  617 

the  deepest  facts  of  life  have  a  strong  hold — ^as  one  who  is  in 
love  with  Nature,  and  with  beauty  wherever  it  is  seen,  who 
values  and  delights  in  the  simplicity  of  children,  appreciates 
entirely  the  matters  of  sex,  and  because  he  is  wiser  than 
clever  men  is  himself  as  simple  as  a  child.  His  unworldliness 
was  of  the  kind  that  sees  toward  the  bottom  of  things, 
through  the  appearance  of  things.*  His  long  brooding  medi- 
tation had  deeper  results  than  the  surface  observation  with 
which  many  painters  and  writers  must  needs  be  content.  He 
watched  and  considered,  now  with  sweetness  and  now  with 
indignation,  men's  chequered  destiny.  .In  his  mind,  in  the 
end,  it  was  the  sweetness  that  triumphed.  He  lived  obscure 
and  died  in  indigence — was  born  over  a  shop  in  Broad  Street, 
Golden  Square,  and  died,  an  old  man  in  a  mean  court  out  of 
the  Strand.  In  his  age,  and  in  his  poverty,  and  in  his  expe- 
rience that  the  world  had  brought  him  few  of  its  recognized 
goods,  he  could  yet  say  to  a  child,  as  his  blessing,  **  May  God 
make  this  world  as  beautiful  to  you  as  it  has  been  to  me." 
So  much  was  his  own  life,  as  has  been  well  said,  "  instinctive 
and  wholly  interior  " — so  faithful  was  he  to  a  conception  of 
life  untainted  by  the  bitterness  of  evil  chance. 

The  Broad  Street,  Golden  Square,  of  Blake's  childhood — 
the  middle  of  the  last  century,  for  he  was  born  in  1757— was 
not  quite  so  dull  a  place  in  which  first  to -see  the  light  as  it 
would  be  now*  For  the  neighborhood  has  greatly  fallen. 
Mr.  Gilchrist — who  must  have  had  much  of  that  rare  love  of 
imaginative  men  for  cities  and  the  associations  of  cities — has 
properly  reminded  us  that  the  Golden  Square  neighborhood, 
the  neighborhood  immediately  east  of  what  is  now  the  lower 
part  of  Regent  Street,  and  yet  immediately  west  of  Soho 
proper,  held  social  status  at  least  equal  to  the  Cavendish 
Square  neighborhood  of  our  own  day.  Wardour  Street,  the 
busy  manufactory  of  new  old  furniture ;  Poland  Street,  with 
its  small  printing-offices,  its  coffee-houses,  its  dwellings  ap- 
portioned in  many  tenements  to  the  lodgings  of  theatrical 


6l  8  THE  LIBRAR  Y'MA  GAZINE. 

artists  not  yet  celebrated  and  of  dressmakers  never  to  be  in 
vogue ;  Golden  Square,  itself,  with  its  one  or  two  foreign 
hotels,  its  minor  hospital,  its  mansion  devoted  to  the  book- 
binder or  the  fencing-master,  all  this  was  then  fairly  "  fash- 
ionable," if  not  precisely  "  aristocratic."  And  Broad  Street, 
like  the  Whigmore  Street,  or  the  Mount  Street,  or  North 
Audley  Street,  of  to-day,  was  a  street  chiefly  of  good  shops, 
varied  by  a  few  private  houses,  instead  of  the  decayed  if  spa- 
cious thoroughfare  which  we  see  at  present,  where  a  barber 
who  occasionally  sells  acheap  violin  to  a  member  of  the  roy- 
alty or  of  the  Princess's  orchestra,  has  a  shop  next  to  that  of 
a  furniture  dealer's  at  which  you  pick  up  brass  fenders  bought 
at  country  sales,  and  where  next  again  comes  the  French 
washerwoman's — ^the  blanchisseuse  de  fin — ^whose  appren- 
tices are  ironing  delicate  linen  in  the  open  room  as  you  pass 
by.  Thus,  though  Blake's  first  associations  were  prosaic — 
since  he  was  a  draper's  son — ^they  were  not  sordid  nor  mean. 

It  is  strange,  however,  to  think  of  the  wonderful  artist  and 
poet,  the  man  of  high  imagination,  brought  up  among  even 
these  surroundings.  A  poetic  spirit  of  weaker  quality  would 
have  found  itself  crushed  by  them.  On  Blake  the}'^  had  no 
effect,  for  it  was  in  the  main  truly  that  in  his  maturest  years, 
he  was  able  to  write,  "  I  assert  for  myself  that  I  do  not  behold 
the  outward  creation,  and  that  to  me  it  is  hindrance  and  not 
action."  Where  other  people  saw  the  sun  rise — a  round  disk 
like  a  guinea — Blake  saw  **  an  innumerable  company  of  the 
heavenly  host,  crying  holy !  holy !  holy ! " — and  praising  God 
— not  indeed  for  Broad  Street,  Golden  Square — but  for  the 
wealth  of  Nature  and  beauty  that  were  so  much  outside  of  it. 

But  Blake's  pre-occupation  with  spiritual  matters,  with  the 
lasting  essentials  of  life,  did  not  prevent  him  from  observing 
keenly  the  people  he  met,  and  from  judging  their  characters 
with  a  rapid  correctness  which  belongs  only  to  the  man  of  the- 
world,  and  to  the  deeper  man  of  the  world,  a  great  poet.  A 
story  of  his  boyhood  confirms  us  in  this  belief.    He  was  fooi^ 


WILLIAM  BLAKE.    .  619 

teen  years  old  when  it  was  finally  decided  that  he  should  be 
educated  as  a  professional  engraver,  and  it  was  at  first  pro- 
prosed  that  a  quite  noted  engraver  of  the  day,  one  Ryland', 
should  become  his  master.  Father  and  son  went  to  Ryland's 
work-room,  to  see  the  engraver  at  work.  **  I  do  not  like  the 
man's  /acei"  said  William  Blake  to  his  parent,  on  coming  away; 
"it  looks  as  if  he  will  live  to  be  hanged."  Twelve  years  after- 
ward, the  then  prosperous  engraver  fell  into  evil  ways — com- 
mitted a  forgery — and  was  hung  as  the  boy  had  predicted. 
Blake's  dislike  to  Ryland's  countenance  had  had  the  effect  of 
causing  his  father  to  seek  some  other  master.  The  one  se- 
lected was  James  Basire,  the  most  distinguished  member  of  a 
family  of  engravers,  a  man  whose  sterling  but  necesarily  un- 
inspired work  is  worthy  even  nowadays  of  quite  as  much  re- 
spect as  it  receives.  It  is  amusing  to  remember  how  Blake, 
affectionate  and  ardent,  earnestly  upheld  it  long  after  he  had 
ceased  to  be  Basire's  pupil.  For  him,  Basire's  name  was  the 
symbol  of  all  that  was  good  in  recent  engraving,  and  the  more 
popular  Wollett's  the  symbol  of  all  that  was  bad.  Of  course 
Blake's  zeal  outstepped  his  judgment  here ;  the  real  beauty 
of  William  Wollett's  work,  obtained  by  delicate  observation 
and  patient  hand,  no  one  who  is  removed  from  the  controver- 
sies of  the  moment  will  care  to  gainsay.  Masters  of  classic 
grace  and  of  elegant  pastoral — masters  like  Berghem,  Claude, 
and  Richard  Wilson — he  was  born  to  interpret.  But  Blake 
said  that  Wollett  did  not  know  how  to  grind  his  graver ;  did 
not  know  how  to  put  so  much  labor  into  a  hand  or  foot  as 
Basire  did;  did  not  know  how  to  draw  the  leaf  of  a  tree. 
"  All  his  study  was  clean  strokes  and  mossy  tints." 

At  James  Basire's,  in  Great  Queen  Street,  nearly  opposite 
Freemasons'  Tavern,  .young  William  Blake's  prentice-hand 
began  to  grow  into  the  hand  of  a  master.  Also  he  was  sent 
into  Westminster  Abbey  and  various  old  churches  to  make 
drawings  from  the  monuments  and  buildings,  which  Basire  was 
employed  by  Gough,  the  antiquary,  to  engrave,  '*  a  circum- 


620  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

stance  he  always  mentioned  with  gratitude^  to  Basire,"  and 
one  which,  as  Blake's  best  biographer  has  rightly  discerned, 
was  much  adapted  to  foster  the  romantic  turn  of  his  imag'ina- 
tion,  and  to  strengthen  his  natural  affinities  for  the  spiritual  in 
art.  The  character  of  Blake  was  fast  developing :  there  were 
seen  already  those  many-sided  sympathies  with  art  "which 
made  him  engraver,  painter  and  poet.  The  task  oi  the  en- 
graver, however  artistic  an  one,  was  too  slow  and  too  little 
.  spontaneous  to  content  Blake  wholly.  A  copyist,  even  of  the 
most  intelligent  and  learned  kind,  he  was  not  satisfied  always 
to  remain.  He  would  not  only  reproduce — he  must  directly 
create.  And  so  we  come  upon  the  first  of  his  inventions  in 
design  and  upon  the  first  of  his  poems.  In  both,  with  what- 
ever faults  of  execution,  he  showed  himself  original ;  but  at 
first,  perhaps,  more  particularly  in  poetry.  The  poetry  of  Na- 
ture and  of  natural  sentiment,  that  a  generation  or  two  later 
was  too  sweep  all  other  poetical  effort  away,  had  then  hardly 
begun  in  England.  Blake  composed  his  earlier  verses  years 
before  Burns  addressed  the  public  of  Cilmamock ;  years  be- 
fore William  Cowper,  Esquire,  of  the  Middle  Temple,  had 
issued  his"  Poems  " — still  longer  before  the  "-Lyrical  Ballads  " 
which,  in  1798,  Cottle,  the  Bristol  bookseller,  gave  to  but  few 
readers,  had  proceeded  from  the  close  association  and  friend- 
ship of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge. 

A  freedom  of  natural  sentiment  was  in  these  earliest  poems 
of  Blake's — a  happy  and  inspired  carelessness  as  to  the  way 
the  thing  was  said,  if  only  the  feeling  at  the  bottom  of  all  did 
get  itself  expressed — very  remarkable  indeed  in  a  generation 
which  had  for  its  models  poetry  quite  obviously  artificial, 
poetry  in  which  thin  thought  and  shallow  feeling  were  wrought 
into  fineness  of  phrase.  But  yet  these  earliest  poems  are  not 
the  poems  by  which  Blake  secures  his  immortality.  They  are 
not  the  poems  which  thoughtful  and  tasteful  folk  will  most 
care  about,  nor  are  they  the  obscure  if  profound  work  whidi* 
as  days  went  on,  Blake  himself,  it  may  be,  got  to  cooiider'- 


WILLIAM  BLAKE,  62 1 

His  highest  productions.  A  little  time  had  yet  to  pass  be- 
fore Blake's  poetic  genius  found  full  expression — before 
there  came  to  him  both  the  best  theme  and  the  artless  art  to 
treat  it.  He  had  to  pass  through  this  period  of  studentship 
at  the  newly  formed  Royal  Academy,  he  had  to  be  a  loyer  and 
he  had  to  be  an  independent  artist,  before  his  mind  was  ready 
with  the  "  Songs  of  Innocence,"  or  could  be  delivered  later  of 
the  "  Songs  of  Experience." 

Blake's  marriage  was  a  marriage  of  consolation.  He  had 
thought  himself  in  love — he  had. perhaps  been  actually  in 
love— with  that  mysteiious  being  whom  the  sentimental 
dramatist  and  the  sentimental  novel-writer  described  as  "  an- 
other." And  "  another"  had  been  careless  about  the  young 
painter  and  poet ;  "  another  "  had  been  obdurate  and  unkind. 
Having  suffered  his  addresses  for  a  certain  season — having 
talked  and  walked  with  him  in  unconventional  ways  which 
bred  great  hopefulness  in  his  mind — she  suddenly  tired  of  it. 
And  the  young  lover  was  left,  not  pining  in  silence,  but  some- 
what loudly  lamenting.  A  girl,  who  was  more  of  a  bystander 
than  an  acquaintance,  said  very  frankly,  that  she  "pitied  him 
from  the  bottom  of  her  heart,"  and  William  Blake  began  to 
love  her  for  her  pity,  and  she  accepted  his  love.  Catharine 
Sophia  Boucher,  bom  of  humble  parents  in  the  then  remote 
suburb  of  Battersea,  was  a  good-looking  brunette,  with  a  fine 
figure,  with  industrious  hands,  an  active  mind,  and  little  or  no 
education.  She  could  not  sign  her  name  in  the  parish  register 
kept  at  Battersea  church,  where  she  and  Blake  were  married ; 
but  she  was  capable  of  learning,  and  for  many  long  years  after 
he  first  met  her — from  his  youth  to  the  time  of  his  old  age, 
when  she  alone  watched  by  him  in  his  last  moments — she  was 
a  pleasure  and  a  help  to  Blake.  A  little  of  the  spirit  of  the 
artist  seems  to  have  been  in  her.  As  time  went  on,  she  was 
found  capable  of  making  a  very  few  designs  in  the  Blake 
manner,  and  both  during  Blake's  life,  and,  we  suppose,  after 
his  death,  she  colored  some  of  the  prints  which  he  published 


623  THE  LI  BRA  R  Y  MA  GA  ZINE. 

— if  almost  private  issue  can  be  called  publication — along-  with 
his  poems.  She  did  not,  it  is  true,  color  them  very  well,  and 
the  Blake  collector  likes  to  have  his  copies  colored  by  the 
more  skilled  hand  of  the  original  inventor ;  .  but  still  she 
seconded  him  to  the  best  of  her  powers — had  always  a  wise 
interest  in  her  husbaiid's  work,  and  a  full  belief  in  him. 

Employed  to  engrave  designs  after  Stothard  and  others  in 
the  Wits'  Magazine — which  was  by  no  means  a  wholly  comic 
miscellany,  but  politely  intended  rather  for  people  who  had 
wits  than  for  witty  people — Blake  fell  into  various  employ- 
ment. In  1784  he  made  his  second  appearance  as  an  exhibitor 
at  the  Royal  Academy,  and  in  the  following  j'ear  he  likewise 
exhibited.  His  father  was  now  dead,  but  Blake  was  living  in 
the  street  of  his  birth — Broad  Street — in  partnership  for  a 
time  with  one  Parker,  as  it  seemed  necessary  to  be  print- 
seller  as  well  as  artist.  Parker  and  he  disagreed — ^the  part- 
nership was  dissolved — and  Blake  moved  a  short  way  from 
Broad  Street,  to  Poland  Street,  near  the  top  on  the  eastern 
side.  He  was  very  poorly  off,  and  Mrs.  Blake,  in  household 
matters,  had  to  practice  the  severest  economy.  There  had 
already  long  been  evident  much  in  Blake's  character  that 
was  incompatible  with  the  attainment  of  material  success. 

The  man  who  on  the  death  of  his  brother  Robert,  whom  he 
had  greatly  loved,  had  been  able  to  declare  that  that  brother's 
spirit,  loth  at  first  to  leave  the  earth,  had  at  length  clapped 
its  hands  for  peaceful  joy  at  departure,  as  it  passed  upwards 
through  the  ceiling,  was  a  man  whose  imagination  was'  not 
likely  to  be  of  the  kind  admired  by  the  ordinary  picture 
buyer.  That  indeed  was  the  crazy  side  of  Blake — ^a  craziness 
absolutely  harmless  except  as  far  as  concerns  the  material 
prospects  of  the  person  who  is  a  prey  to  it — but  such  occa- 
sional craziness  in  Blake  was  inseparably  united  to  the  fine^ 
ness  of  his  imagination.  The  force  of  his  vision  of  spiritual 
things  brought  with  it,  almost  as  a  necessity,  these  faQcies» 
and  both  incapacitated  him  for  popular  work.    Both  w«Msli 


■■:   '  :^.  -I 


.   WILLIAM  BLAKE.  623 

have  told  against  him  perhaps  at  any  time,  but  never  more 
decidedly  and  surely  than  in  the  latter  half  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  when  intellect  was  constantly  skeptical  and  hardly 
at  all  imaginative — when  there  was  the  least  disposition  and 
the  least  ability  to  make  allowance  for  the  vagaries  of  a  seer 
of  visions  and  a  dreamer  of  dreams. 

Unencouraged  then,  and  uncommissioned,  by  the  public — 
thus  far  in  the  cold  and  dark  of  general  neglect — the  simple 
man  set  himself  to  the  accomplishment  of  a  congenial  task, 
and  the  "  Songs  of  Innocence  "  were  gradually  written  and 
furnished  with  their  appropriate  designs.  Of  late  years 
'*  Songs  of  Innocence  "  have  been  given  to  the  public  in  the 
form  of  common  print,  like  the  work  of  every  other  poet,  who 
has  written  and  published,  since  printing  was  known.  But  it 
was  not  so  that  Blake  sought  to  present  his  poems  to  that 
limited  world  for  which  alone  he  expected  to  cater.  He 
laboriously  engraved  the  verses,  as  he  engraved  the  designs, 
and  the  ornamental  borders,  and  having  printed  it  all  off — 
picture,  verse,  and  ornamental  border — he  set  himself,  a^ 
copies  were  wanted  for  sale,  to  fill  in  the  picture  and  the  bor- 
der with  wash  and  stroke  of  color,  and  this  plan,  first  con- 
ceived for  the  "  Songs  ol  Innocence,"  he  adhered  to  throughout 
his  life.  The  pecuniary  reward  of  such  a  plan  was  not  neces- 
sarily so  slight  as  in  Blake's  experience  it  turned  out  to  be. 
A  painter-poet  of  our  own  day  could  make  it  yield  a  sufficient 
harvest  of  money,  if  he  tried.  Curiosity  would  be  roused 
about  it ;  there  would  be  ecstatic  brethren  to  sing  its  praises 
in  society ;  it  would  be  written  about  in  the  weekly  news- 
papers— especially  if  it  we^^e  not  going  to  be  exhibited.  But 
with  Blake,  the  presence  of  these  beautiful  designs — ^their 
outlines  printed  indeed,  but  their  colors  filled  in  by  hand,  so 
that  no  two  copies  could  be  alike — ^with  Blake,  the  presence 
of  these  beautiful  designs  did  not  so  greatly  enhance  the  price 
of  the  verse.  Whoever  chose  to  buy  the  wonderful  work 
could  buy  it  at  a  price  that  was  absolutely  insignificant 


624  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

Moreover,  the  demand  for  it  was  always  limited,  thoug-h  it 
never  quite  ceased.  In  each  department  of  Art  that  Blake 
essayed  in  the  "  Songs  of  Innocence,"  he  was  without  doubt 
triumphant.  He  made  homely  and  beautiful  designs,  poems 
which  in  their  order  of  merit  are  yet  more  unique  than  the 
drawings,  and  in  the  treatment  of  the  ornamental  borders  he 
showed  himself  a  fine  decorative  artist.  There  is  present  in 
the  designs,  as  we  know  them  by  the  necessarily  uncolordd 
examples  in  Gilchrist's  "  Life,"  something  that  is  common  to 
a  group  of  eighteenth  century  artists,  and  much  that  is  only 
Blake's.  Fuseli  said  that  Blake  was  good  to  steal  from. 
Blake,  later  in  his  life,  charged  Stothard  with  stealing  from  him 
in  "The  Canteibury  Pilgrims;  "and  with  many  of  Blake's  other 
designs  Stothard's  have  much  affinity.  In  both  men's  'work 
there  is  apparent  the  easy  and  simple  grace  in  movement  and 
costume  which  belonged  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  centur5% 
and  which — often,  however,  with  some  touch  of  the  masque- 
rade— ^is  with  us  again  to-day.  To  those  who  do  not  know 
Blake  himself,  to  say  that  the  grouping  of  figures  in  the  sim- 
ple costume  of  the  period  very  slightly  idealized,  very  slig^htly 
classicized — as  in  the  "Echoing  Green"  for  instance — is 
Stothard-like,  is  to  convey  a  first  general  idea.  But  in  such 
a  drawing  as  that  of  "  The  Lamb,"  wherein  a  naked  child  ex- 
tends his  arms,  welcomingly,  to  creatures  made  and  loved 
like  himself  by  God  (for  that  is  the  moral  of  the  poem),  it  is  a 
-  pure  naturalist  who  conceives  the  situation  and  expresses  it 
in  line — his  only  reminiscences  being,  seemingly,  of  Floren- 
tine art.  In  the  landscape,  too,  whether  it  be  the  thatched 
roof  of  the  cattle  shed,  or  the  thick-spreading  elm  tree,  or  the 
bit  of  bending  willow,  there  is  more  of  naturalism  than  would 
have  been  quite  acceptable  to  the  orderly  art  of  Stothard. 
And  with  all  appreciation  of  Stothard's  art — of  its  more  con- 
stant suavity,  its  greater  general  correctness—we  are  bound 
to  hold  it,  in  its  rendering  of  the  gesture  of  the  figure,  less 
expressive  than  Blake's.    It  is  more  occupied  with  an  ex- 


WILLIAM  BLAKE,  625 

temal  gr?ice.  There  is  less  emotion  in  it.  The  designs  for 
the  "  Songs  of  Experience,"  that  after  some  lapse  of  years  folr 
lowed  the  earlier  series,  are — as  fitting  accompaniments  to 
the  poenis  themselves — at  once  bolder  and  more  obscure, 
with  figures  of  gesture  more  fearful  or  more  enraptured,  with 
a  passionate  abandonment,  never  sought  for,  and  never 
wanted,  in  the  "  Songs  of  Innocence." 

And  now  we  have  come  to  the  brief  consideration  of  these 
two  collections  of  poems.  The  two  collections  of  designs 
may  be  considered  apart,  but  the  poems  must  be  considered 
together.  The  mood  in  each  collection  is  so  different,  yet  it 
is  the  same  nature  that  is  at  bottom  of  the  passing  mood. 

The  "  Songs  of  Innocence  "  were  written  when  the  young 
manhood  of  Blake,  filled  with  the  joy  of  his  work,  had  hardly 
realized  how  much  of  failure  there  was  in  the  world — still  less 
how  much  of  failure  was  coming  to  him.  In  the  "  Songs  of 
Itinocence "  the  spiritual  man  entered  into  the  heart  of  ^ 
child,  and  sang,  in  joyous  temper,  of  the  life  of  children  in 
country  and  town.  The  "  Echoing  Green  "  is  a  piece  of  de- 
lightful music  made  to  celebrate  the  pleasures  of  the  place 
where  village  children  make  holiday.  "Holy  Thursday" 
sings  pleasantly  and  touch ingly  about  the  charity  children  at 
St.  Paul's.  The  introduction  to  the  series — the  poem  begin- 
ning "  Piping  down  the  valleys  wild  " — ^tells  by  an  allegory 
how  Blake  was  singing  for  children  and  for  those  who  cared 
for  them :  a  piper,  he  says,  was  piping  to  a  child,  and  the 
child  made  him  repeat  his  tune,  and  "  sing  his  songs  of  happy 
cheer,"  and  told  him  finally,  in  sign  of  satisfaction,  that  he 
must  sit  him  down  and  write,  *'  in  a  book  that  all  may  read." 
'*  So  he  vanished  from  my  side,"  says  William  Blake,  in  the 
character  of  the  piper, — 

So  he  vanished  from  my  side, 

And  I  plucked  a  hollow  reed, 
And  I  made  a  rural  pen, 

And  I  stained  the  water  clear. 
And  I  wrote  my  happy  songs 
1  Every  child  may  joy  to  hear. 


626  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

The  "Songs  of  Experience"  wefe  written  only  a  few  years 
after,  but  in  a  temper  widely  different.  It  would  be  particu- 
larly interesting  if  some  one  of  the  few  people  who  know 
Blake  profoundly  and  minutely,  and  who  have  derived  a 
part  of  their  knowledge  from  old  men  still  living  who  came 
into  intimate  contact  with  him — ^John  Linnell  is  one  of  these 
— it  would  be  interesting,  we  say,  if  some  one  so  qualified 
would  tell  us  what  brought  in  so  comparatively  short  a  time 
a  change  of  temper  so  complete.  The  problem  is  one  which 
Mr.  Gilchrist's  admirable  book  does  not  absolutely  solvie. 
Blake  himself  must  have  been  conscious  of  the  thoroughness 
of  the  change — conscious  too,  as  we  have  declared  before,  that 
the  same  nature  lay  behind  the  varying  moods.  For  by  a 
method  particular  to  himself  he  may  almost  be  said  to  have 
called  attention  to  the  change — to  have  empfiasized  the  differ- 
ence. To  begin  with,  his  very  titles  establish  a  sort  of  an- 
tithesis between  "  Innocence  "  and  "  Experience."  Clearly 
the  one  is  to  be  contrasted  with  the  other.  Again,  at  least 
two  of  the  separate  poems  have  their  titles  repeated ;  the 
title  of  something  in  the  first  publication  is  found  again  in  the 
second.  "The  Chimney  Sweeper"  and  "Holy  Thursday" 
are  the  cases  in  point.  Both  are  poems  of  the  city,  and 
naturally  so ;  for,  first,  the  country  never  suggested  the  con- 
trasts which  are  here  in  question,  and,  secondly,  the  "  Songs 
of  Ejq)erience  "  are  little  occupied  with  the  country  at  all. 
The  "  Chimney  Sweeper,"  as  we  find  it  in  the  two  volumes, 
presents  the  contrast  most  sharply ;  from  the  allegro  of  the 
first  song  we  proceed  suddenly  to  a  depth  "  deeper  than  ever 
the  andante  dived."  The  first  tells  of  a  little  boy — one  Tom 
Dacre — ^who 

cried  when  his  head. 
That  curled  like  a  Iambus  back,  was  shaved, 

and  to  whom  the  speaker,  a  little  boy  sweep  also,  spoke  reas- 
suringly : 

And  so  he  was  quiet,  and  that  very  night 

As  Tom  was  a-sleeping  he  had  such  a  sight ; 

That  thousands  of  sweepers,  Dick,  Joe,  Ned,  and  Jackt 

Were  all  of  them  locked  up  in  coffins  of  black. 


WILLIAM  BLAKE.  p27 

And  by  came  an  angel  who  had  a  bright  key, 
And  he  opened  the  coffins  and  set  them  all  free  * 
Then  down  a  greeh  plain,  leaping,  laughing,  they  run. 
And  wash  in  a  river,  and  shine  in  the  sun. 

And  the  angel  speaks  very  hopefully  to  the  chimney 
sweeper,  telling  him  chiefly  that  if  he  were  a  good  boy  he 
would  have  "  Gtxi  for  his  father,  and  never  want  joy."  The 
two  promises  expressed  Blake's  conception  of  heaven;  the 
sense  of  the  reality  of  the  first  was  constantly  with  him. 

Now,  *'The  Chimney  Sweeper"  in  "Songs  of  Experience,** 
breaks  in  upon  this  innocent  peace.  Even  the  little  child, 
who  speaks  in  the  poem,  catches  the  shadow  of  thd  writer's 
gloom.  He  says  that  his  father  and  his  mother  are  gone  up  to 
the  church  to  pray,  having  taken  him  from  the  heath  where 
he  was  happy,  to  make  him  the  little  black  slave  of  his  master. 
They  clothed  him  in  '*  the  clothes  of  death,"  and  by  the  hard 
fate  to  which  they  condemned  him,  they  taught  him  to  "  sing 
the  notes  of  woe."  Somehow,  as  Blake  so  subtly  saw,  the 
youth  of  his  spirit  asserted  itslf.  They  could  not  quite  crush 
out  of  him  his  childhood  and  its  instinctive  joy.  But  they  had 
done  their  worst,  and  there  was  the  bitterness  of  it. 

And  because  I  am  happy  and  dance  and  sing, 

fThey  think  they  have  done  me  no  injury. 
And  are  gone  to  praise  Ood  and  his  Pnest  and  King, 

Who  make  up  a  heaven  of  our  misery. 

In  the  two  "  Holy  Thursdays,"  again,  two  different  views 
are  taken  of  the  lives  of  children.  The  one  is  the  view  sug- 
gested to  an  easily-satisfied  man  by  the  spectacle  of  the 
charity  children  under  the  dome  of  St.  Paul's.  He  sees,  com- 
placently, "their  innocent  faces  clean."  They  are  to  him 
"these  flowers  of  London  town."  To  him  they  have  "a 
radiance  all  their  own."  But  in  the  second  "  Holy  Thurs- 
day "  Blake  wants  to  know  whether  it  is  "  a  holy  thing  "  to  see, 
in  a  rich  and  fruitful  land,  "  babes  reduced  to  misery  "  ? 

Is  that  trembling  cry  a  song, 

Can  it  be  a  song  of  joy. 
And  so  many  children  poor 

It  is  a  land  of  poverty. 


623  .•-    THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

And  the  moral,  to  the  poet,  still  simple  in  his  bitterness,  is 
that  things  are  very  wrong : 

For  where'er  the  sun  does  shine 

And  where'er  the  rain  does  fall, 
Babes  should  never  hunger  there, 

Nor  poverty  the  mind  appal. 

.  Having  stated  which  truth,  or  truism,  in  his  strongest  poet's 
way,  and  so  done  his  part,  he  ends — leaving  the  matter  to  the 
political  economists,  who,  as  it  would  appear^  have  not,  during 
these  hundred  years,  succeeded  in  settling  it. 

But  the  strongest  and  most  passionate  note  uttered  in 
**  Songs  of  Experience  "  is  one  which  is  uttered  only  there,  and 
there  only  once.  .  It  is  in  the  poem  which  he  calls  simply  "  Lon- 
don " — in  it,  before  his  mental  eye,  the  evils  of  the  town  are 
concentrated,  are  brought  to  a  focus.  It  seems  that  as  he 
walks  in  London  the  faces  that  he  sees  make  him  wretched. 
His  view,  however  it  may  be  morbid  and  exaggerated,  shows 
at  all  events  one  side  of  a  truth^ — he  sees,  in  every  face  he 
meets,  "  marks  of  weakness,  marks  of  woe."  There  is  some- 
thing sad  to  him  in  "the  cry  of  every  man  " — ^the  infant's,  the 
chimney  sweep's,  the  ill-fated  soldier's.  But  most  it  is  a  wom- 
an's cry  that  strikes  upon  his  spiritual  ear. 

Most  through  midnight  streets  I  hear  ^ 

How  the  youthful  harlot's  curse 
Blasts  the  new-born  infant's  tear, 

And  blights  with  plagues  the  marriage  hearse. 

His  feeling  here  has  waxed  too  strong  for  his  power  of  ex- 
pression. He  is  so  intense  that  he  becomes  obscure.  But  his 
obscurity  with  his  volume  of  passion,  is  worth,  many  times 
over,  the  lucid  mediocrity  of  less  inspired  bards. 

Perhaps  we  have  now  succeeded — as  far  as  brevity  allowed — 
in  making  clear  to  some  the  order  of  beauty,  both  of  design 
and  of  song,  which  is  to  be  found,  if  it  is  properly  sought,  in 
the  finest  works  of  Blake — in  the  things  by  which  he  will 
certainly  live.  That  is  what  we  wanted  to  do.  In  other  places 
it  is  easy  and  convenient  to  find  accounts  of  his  later  and 
more  voluminous  writings,  of  his  more  ambitious  desigiis; 


WILLIAM  BLAKE.  629 

such  a  great  series  as  that,  for  instance,  which  he  executed 
for  the  "  Night  Thoughts  "  of  Young ;  such  poems  of  his  own 
as  those  included  under  the  name  of  the  "  Prophetic  Books," 
some  of  them  strange  visions  and  strange  prophecies,  which 
we  take  to  be  more  curious  than  finally  satisfactory. 
~  To  return,  with  however  short  a  treatment,  to  the  story  of 
his  outward  life.  He  lived  long  in  Lambeth  aftei:  he  was  in 
Broad  Street,  Hercules  Buildings,  the  abode,  if  we  mistake 
not,  of  another  neglected  genius,  the  Triplet  of  "  Masks  and 
Faces."  Hayley,  the  biographer  of  Romney,  and  hirnself  quite 
a  considerable  poet  in  his  own  day — people  estimated  him,  of 
course,  a  good  deal  by  his  riches  and  by  the  excellence  of  his 
country  house.  Hayley  encouraged  Blake  tor  awhilp,  and 
induced  him  \o  remove  to  Felpham  in  Sussex,  at  the  foot  of 
that  Sussex  Down  country  which  Copley  Fielding  afterwards 
painted,  and  which  Mr.  Hine,  in  our  own  day,  is  painting  with 
even  more  wonderful  subtlety.  Hayley  lived  in  that  country- 
side— had  the  good  house  of  the  district — it  was  there  that 
the  too  frequent  painter  of  the  "  Divine  Emma  "  came  on  his 
annual  visit.  And  ^Hayley  gave  Blake  commissions,  during 
Blake V residence  there.  But  at  length  the  almost  inevitable 
fussiness  of  a  wealthy  dilettante  of  absolute  leisure  began  to 
annoy  Blake  very  much — began  to  disturb  and  to  thwart  him. 
He  wrote  to  London  friends  that  he  felt  bound  to* return.  He 
looked  for  the  day  of  his  deliverance,  and  at  last  it  came.  In 
London,  at  that  period,  Mr.  Butts  was  his  best  patron:  the 
friendly  and  always  business-like  purchaser  of  so  many  of 
Blake's  designs.  Interesting  accounts  between  them  are  fur- 
nished in  Mrs.  Gilchrist's  new  edition  of  her  husband's  book. 
Returning  to  town,  and  living  long  in  South  Molton  Street, 
Blake  was  associated  more  or  less  with  Flaxman  and  Stoth- 
ard  ;  he  was  considerably  wronged,  it  seems,  by  Cromek  ;  and 
he  had  the  faithful  friendship  of  John  Linnell.  Linnell  lived 
then  at  a  remote  farmhouse  on  the  far  side  of  Hampstead,  and 
there  Blake  used  very  often  to  visit  him.  unbending,  giving 


630  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

hiilisell  out  in  genial  chat.  It  must  have  seemed  pretty  clear 
to  the  poet  by  that  time  that  no  wide  popularity  was  coming 
to  his  verses — that  no  great  prices,  such  as  the  most  impudent 
of  incapacity  cheerfully  asks  in  our  own  day,  were  ever' to  be 
got  for  his  pictures.  But  he,  and  his  wife  with  him,  went  con- 
tentedly on — she,  believing  altogether  in  her  husband;  be, 
believing  altogether  in  the  paramount  importance  of  his 
spiritual"  world,  the  comparative  insignificance  of  material 
things.  Poverty  closed  round  him.  He  had  no  studio  rich  with 
the  spoils  of  the  East  and  of  Italy,  and  adroitly  enhancing  to 
the  innoctent  purchaser  the  value  of  all  work  done  in  it.  He 
had  now  a  few  bareish  rooms  in  Fountain  Court,  out  of  the 
Strand.  There  ill  health  and  enfeebled  age  fell  upon  him.  He 
engraved  what  plates  he  could — realized  what  inventions  he 
could — sometimes  even  when  confined  not  only  to  his  rooms, 
but  to  his  bed.  Getting  out,  now  and  again,  he  fetches  his  own 
beer  from  some  public-house  at  the  corner — meets,  under  those 
circumstances,  an  artist  who  is  just  sufficiently  celebrated  to 
be  careful  with  whom  he  is  seen,  and  not  exalted  enough  to  be 
indifferent  to  what  may  be  thought  of  the  company  he  chooses 
to  keep.  And  the  just  sufficiently  celebrated  artist  d®es  not, 
under  those  circumstances,  think  it  prudent  to  speak  to  him. 
Blake  goes  home,  only  a  little  amused  by  the  incident,  to  the 
rooms  in  Fountain  Court. 

There  he  was  known  by,  amongst  other  artists,  an  artist 
then  quite  young,  and  now  venerable,  Samuel  Palmer.  Mr. 
Gilchrist  wanted  Mr.  Samuel  Palmer's  impression  of  Blake, 
and  in  a  very  graphic,  touching,  and  significant  letter,  Mr. 
Palmer  gave  it.  .  This  is  how  he  concludes : — 

He  was  one  of  the  few  to  be  met  with  in  our  passage  through  life  who  are  not  in  some 
way  or  other  "double  minded  "  and  inconsistent  with  themselves ;  one  of  the  very  few 
who  cannot  be  depressed  by  neglect,  and  to  whose  name  rank  and  station  could  add  no 
luster.  Moving  apart,  in  a  sphere  above  the  attraction  of  worldly'honors,  he  did  not 
accept  greatness,  but  confer  it.  He  ennobled  poverty,  and  by  his  conversation  and 
the  influence  of  his  genius,  made  two  small  rooms  in  Fountain  Court  more  attractive 
than  the  threshold  of  princes. 

Such  is  the  testimony  of  one  who  knew  him--of  one  who 


FRANCIS  BRE T  HARTE,  63 1 

was  able  to  appreciate  him — was  William  Blake.  And  so  died 
on  the  1 2th  of  August,  1827,  watched  chiefly  by  his  wife,  the 
great  inventor,  the  seer  of  visions  so  powerfully  and  so  terri- 
bly direct,  engaged  at  the  last  in  "composing  and  uttering 
songs  to  his  Maker."  His  wife,  Catherine,  thought  them  so 
beautiful  that  the  poor  old  man  had  need  to 'tell  her  his 
belief,  that  they  were  not  his  songs ;  he  was  but  the  instru- 
ment that  uttered  them.  A  lowly  neighbor  who  went  away 
when  the  old  man  had  finally  sunk,  declared  that  she  had 
been  at  the  death  of  an  angel.  Was  there  then,  in  that  hum- 
ble room,  any  vision  to  gladden  him  like  to  his  own  most 
beautiful  and  most  impressive  design,  "the  Morning  Stars 
singing  for  joy  " — the  expression  of  an  aspiration  of  his  life,  at 
last,  after  long  years,  to  be  realized  ? 

Frederick  Wedmore,  in  Temple  Bar. 


FRANCIS  BRET  HARTE. 

It  is  constantly  said  that  frontiers  have  ceased  to  exist,  that 
oceans  are  bridged  over,  that  steam  and  electricity  have  anni- 
hilated distance,  and  that  every  throb  of  the  great  human 
machine  reverberates  in  both  hemispheres.  If  this  is  true  in 
matters  political,  financial  or  commercial,  how  much  more  in 
the  domain  of  imagination,  science  and  art ! — for  we  hail  with 
fresh  interest  every  new  effort,  triumph  or  discovery,  irre- 
spective of  the  accident  of  its  birth.  It  is,  therefore,  no 
wonder  that  we  Europeans  instantly  responded  to  the  double 
attraction  exercised  by  so  gifted  an  author  as  Mr.  Bret  Harte, 
when  in  his  writings  he  not  only  gratified  our  taste  for  the 
beautiful,  but  likewise  that  innate  craving  of  every  mind  for 
new  scenes,  new  characters,  and  new  emotions. 

Quite  lately  a  new  and  complete  edition  of  his  works,*  clas- 
sified  and  revised  by  himself,   has   enabled    the   public  to 

♦  The  Complete  Works  of  Bret  Harte,  collected  and  revised  by  theauthon  5  vols., 
Chatto  &  Windus. 


632     ^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

appreciate  the  fertility  of  his  talent  both  as  an  autTior  and  a 
poet,  and  to  judge  of  his  labors  as  a  whole ;  while  until  now 
they  had  only  drifted  to  us  in  the  shape  of  contributions  to 
magazines  or  isolated  volumes. 
,  When,  about  fourteen  years  ago,  the  name  of  Bret  Harte 
first  became  known  in  Europe,  his  reputation  was  made,  and 
we  accepted  it  without  protest,  although  it  burst  upon  us  as 
suddenly  as  we  are  told  it  blossomed  full-grown  in  his  native 
land,  the  United  States.  In  his  literary  career  he  seems  to 
have  met  none  of  the  discouraging  rebuffs  which  so  often 
chill  the  efforts  of  beginners ;  he  did  not  linger  with  waver- 
ing and  timid  footsteps  on  the  uphill  road  where  so  many 
slowly  and  tardily  achieve  success.  The  young  author 
grasped  his  pen  with  no  hesitating  fingers,  and  before  it  was 
generally  known  that  a  new  aspirant  to  literary  honors  had 
entered  the  lists,  these  honors  were  his,  and  he  was  proclaimed 
a  master  without  ever  having  been  a  pupil.  We  do  not  mean 
to  say  that  the  critics  did  not  fasten  their  fangs  on  some  of 
his  contributions,  but  they  only  added  to  his  popularity  bj' 
creating  around  his  name  that  notoriety  which  is  like  the 
baptism  of  fire  to  the  untried  soldier.  Through  the  whole  of 
America  and  Europe  his  "  Tales  of  the  Argonauts,"  "  Eastern 
Sketches,"  "  National  Poems,"  "  Spanish  Idyls,"  were  favora- 
bly received  and  promptly  translated.  They  brougljt  to  the 
blase  reader  a  fresh  and  racy  element,  impelling  at  the  same 
time  the  conviction  that  truth  lurked  under  those  seemingly 
fantastic  pictures  of  the  Far  West ;  of  those  Califomian  shores 
which  have  been  the  dream  of  so  many,  the  goal  of  a  few ;  the 
unknown  land  of  golden  hopes,  of  ardent  ambitions,  and  too 
often,  alas!  of  deadly  disappointment. 

Bret  Harte  wrote  of  things  he  had  seen,  of  men  he  had 
known ;  wrote,  as  is  so  rarely  done,  of  what  he  h^felt  or 
experienced.    They  cannot  be  all  creatures  of  his  ir 
tion,  those   lawless   miners,   unscrupulous  gamblers, 
adventurers,  or  hungry  emigrants,  uniting  the  strong^est 


FRANCIS  BRE  T  HAR  TE.    .  63  3 

ers  of  endurance,  tjie  most  heroic  fortitude,  to  the  degrading 
passions  of  the  brute,  and  the  sanguinary  vindictiveness  of 
bandits,  who  acknowledge  no  master,  no  law,  no  God.  With 
a  keen  eye,  a  searching  scrutiny,  he  seizes  and  retains  every 
feature,  every  salient  tone  of  the  story  he  relates  ;  he  paints 
the  mise  en  scene  in  short  but  powerful  and  graphic  sketches  : 
a  few  words  only  and  before  our  mind's  eye  pass  the  desolate 
Sierra,  the  rushing  torrent,  the  snowy  peak,  the  dilapidated 
shanty,  the  dark  and  lonely  road.  .  .  .  When  the  actors  ap- 
pear they  are  living  men  and  women,  not  puppets ;  their  mirth 
is  riotous,  their  manners  are  rough,  their  passions  fierce,  but 
the  warm  blood  courses  through  their  veins,  and  now  and 
then  leaps  to  their  brow.  Whatever  their  failings,  their  vices, 
or  their  crimes,  they  always  remain  faithful  to  their  nature 
and  individuality,  and  move  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  sur- 
roundings in  which  they  are  framed. 

It  has  been  said  that,  judging  Bret  Haite  from  the  majority 
of  his  writings,  it  may  be  gathered  that  he  has  on  the  whole 
a  poor  opinion  of  humanity ;  that  in  his  genius  there  is  a 
satirical  not  to  say  cynical  vein,  which  leads  him  ever  to  select 
for  his  subjects  the  seamy  side,  to  dwell  more  on  what  is 
wrong  than  on  what  is  right,  and  with  disdainful  impartiality  to 
reserve  alike  his  blame  and  his  approval.  We  doubt  it ;  but 
should  it  be  true,  and  should  it  be  a  fault,  it  would  lay  perhaps 
less  in  the  judgment  which  he  withholds,  than  in  the  nature 
of  the  society  which  he  portrays,  and  to  which  he  owes  his 
unparalleled  originality.  His  artistic  tact  tells  him  that  there 
is  a  wider  field  for  his  peculiarly  happy  and  genuine  mode  of 
expression,  when  his  models  are  chosen  from  a  time  when 
men  were  untrammeled  by  opinion,  when  might  was  right, 
when  the  local  coloring  was  crude  and  vivid,  rather  than 
from  those  later  days  when  undaunted  perseverance  and 
rare  energy  had  achieved  the  miraculously  rapid  transforma- 
tion of  California  into  a  civilized  community  instead  of  a  law- 
Ill^  gathering  of  gold-seekers,  the  scum  of  other  nations 

30^4. 


634  THE  LIBJ^AJ^Y  MAGAZINE. 

united  by  the  lust  of  thie  glittering  dust,  and  ever  divided  by 
murderous  thoughts  of  greed  and  rapine.  Who  would  blame 
Bret  Harte  for  preferring  the  picturesque  ruffian^  the  Spanish 
colonist,  the  wild  Irishman,  to  the  refined  commonplace  suc- 
cessors of  those  first  explorers  qf  the  young  country?  He 
does  not  pretend,  and  doea  not  care,  to  introduce  them  other- 
wise than  as  they  really  are ;  but  then  he  possesses  the  price- 
less gift  of  seeing  the  silver  lining  to  the  darkest  cloud;  he 
knows  the  "  open  sesame  "  to  locked  hearts ;  he  can  win  a 
smile  from  sullen  lips,  a  glance  from  proud,  defiant  eyes ;  he 
can  strike  the  spark  of  feeling  even  in  the  most  degraded 
of  human  beings.  If  he  does  select  his  heroines  from  among 
the  least  favored  of  their  sex,  plain  to  ugliness,  uncouth,  rc- 
pellant,  sinned  against  or  sinning,  crushed  out  of  all  sem- 
blance of  what  is  lovable  in  women — ^what  matter  .>  Out  of 
some  hidden  source  of  kindliness  in  his  own  heart  he  with 
subtle  touch  suddenly  elicits  an  unexpected  burst  of  devotion, 
self-sacrifice,  love,  or  passion,  which  at  once  places  the  poor 
lost  wretch  on  as  high  a  moral  ground  as  her  more  immacu- 
late sisters.  It  is  the  same  with  his  male  characters.'  He  takes 
the  rudest  life,  the  most  lowering  associations ;  he  places  in 
their  midst  a  man  devoid  of  moral  sense  or  common  honor, 
committing  crimes  without  hesitation  or  remorse,  and  lo  !  that 
man  also  places  his  foot  on  the  road  of  Damascus ;  a  light 
bursts  upon  him — the  touch  of  baby  fingers,  a  woman's  tears, 
a  comrade's  dying  words — and  with  the  same  dogged  listness- 
ness,  heaven  alone  counting  the  cost,  he  gives  away  his  hopes 
or  his  life,  perchance  as  unconscious  of  being  a  martyr  and  a 
hero  as  he  was  of  having  been  an  outlaw. 

Have  you  seen  Edwin  Booth,  the  admirable  American  trage- 
dian, the  intelligent  interpreter  of  Shakespeare,  act  Ring 
Lear.^  On  the  storm-beaten  heath,  warring  alike  with  the 
elements  and  his  own  growing  madness,  the  actor  has  a 
gesture  of  unspeakable  pathos  when,  with  what  appears  unooiH 
scions  tenderness,  he  draws  his  royal  cloak  around  the  slUr-^ 

iL 


SRANCIS  BRET  HARTE.  635 

ering  form  of  the  boy  buffoon  sobbing  at  his  knee.  It  is  the 
same  spirit  of  innate,  almost  involuntary,  kindliness  which 
seems  to  prompt  Bret  Harte  to  claim — nay,  to  compel— our 
pity  and  our  interests  for  the  outcasts  of  civilization,  the 
•bankrupts  in  happiness  and  virtue,  disinherited  from  their 
cradle  of  all  that  makes  life  worth  living. 

In  biographies  of  the  American  novelist  it  has  been  implied 
that  he  himself  belonged  to  the  wild  race  of  adventurers  he 
appears  to  know  so  well,  and  that,  born  on  the  lowest  rungs 
of  the  social  ladder,  he  rose  by  his  own  exertions  to  the  posi- 
tion he  now  fills.  It  is,  however,  impossible  to  be  acquainted 
with  Mr.  Bret  Harte  without  being  at  once  convinced  of  what 
is,  indeed,  the  fact — that  he  tomes  from  a  good  stock  ;  that 
his  early  surroundings  were  both  intellectual  and  refined; 
and  that,  whatever  may  have  been  the  associates  of  his  youth 
and  manhood,  he  must  as  a  child  have  learned  at  his  mother's 
knee  those  lessons  of  tact,  gentle  breeding,  and  perfect  man- 
ners which  can  never  be  forgotten. 

He  did  not  enrich  his  country  with  the  labors  of  his  pen 
alone.  During  the  troubled  times  of  the  war  of  secession  he 
served  on  the  frontier,  and  later  on  was  appointed  secretary 
of  the  mint.  His  military  career,  though  brief,  was  eminently 
successful.  Among  us  he  is  deservedly  liked  and  admired, 
and  receives  the  same  cordial  reception  in  the  circles  where 
his  literary  and  conversational  powers  are  appreciated,  as 
from  those  who  in  barrack  or  garrison  hail  him  as  a  fellow 
soldier. 

For  a  time  he  was  consul  for  the  United  States  at  Crefeld. 
near  Dusseldorf ;  he  was  not  very  long  ago  transferred  in  the 
same  capacity  to  Glasgow,  leaving  many  regrets  and  many 
friends  behind  him.  There  is  little  doubt,  however,  that  he 
must  soon  be  called  to  fill  a  more  important  post.  In  this 
short  notice  we  do  not  dwell  on  facts  so  universally  known 
as  his  busy  editorship  of  the  Overland  Monthly,  and  Pro- 
fessorship of  Belles  Lettres  at  the  University  of  California 


636  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA GAZINE. 

It  seems  almost  presumptuous  to  give  pre-eminence  tp  any 
particular  selection  from  among  Bi'et  Harte's  works  ;  still,  we 
own  to  a  preference  for  some  of  the  shorter  sketches  and 
minor  poems.  Among  the  latter  there  are  a  few  lines  called 
"  What  the  Wolf  really  said  to  Little  Red  Riding  HcM3d,"» 
which  are  unrivaled  for  grace^  simplicity,  and  delicacy  of 
intention.  It  seems  barel)'- credible  that  the  pen  which  wrote 
"Relieving  Guard,"  "What  the  Bullet  Sang,*'  "Fate,"  with 
their  stern,  forcible,  dramatic  depth,  could  change  to  such 
idyllic  tenderness. 

"  The  Luck  of  Roaring  Camp  "  is  commonly  called  the 
most  perfect  of  all  the  Calif ornian  tales.  It  truly  deserves  its 
world-wide  popularity,  but  we  confess  to  a  partiality  for  two 
others  equally  rich  in  pathos,  feeling,  and  humor,  and  which 
possess  a  strangely  captivating  charm :  "  Tennessee's  Partner," 
the  story  of  a  love  passing  the  love  of  woman,  true  unto 
death  and  beyond  death;  and  "The  Outcasts  of  Poker  Flat," 
where  two  women  who  should  never  have  met — one  because 
so  pure,  the  other  because  so  lost — die  in  each  other's  arms, 
all  unconscious  of  their  great  disparity,  wrapped  in  the  white 
icy  mantle  of  snow  which  shrouds  in  its  stainless  embrace  the 
innocence  of  the  maiden  and  the  shame  of  the  fallen.  Read- 
ing those  tales,  one  cannot  help  wondering  what  the  man  who 
wrote  them  must  have  known  himself  of  friendship  and  of 
pity.  Next  to  these  will  it  ever  be  possible  to  forget "  Mliss," 
"Higgles,"  "The  Rose  of  Tuolumne,"  and  many  more  which 
there  is  no  space  to  mention  ? 

Is  it  not  the  highest  triumph  of  the  poet  and  the  novelist, 
after  having  in  turn  moved  you  tojaughter  or  to  tears,  to  retain 
an  imperishable  hold  on  your  memory.^  This  triumph  is 
Bret  Harte's,  and  will  remain  his  as  long  as  he  writes  with  his 
keen  perception  of  truth,  his  shrewd  humor,  and  that  loyalty 
and  tenderness  of  feeling  which  are  so  exclusively  his  own. 
He  has  at  various  tunes  been  compared  with  other  authors — 
Dickens  in  England,  Merimee  in  France,  etc.    These  paraUel» 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM.  637 

drawn  between  literary  men,  if  flattering  to  one  or  both,  are 
rarely  correct,  and  more  especially  in  this  instance.  Bret 
Harte  stands  quite  alone  on  the  ground  he  has  chosen ;  his 
greatest  claims  to  popularity  are  his  individuality,  his  origi- 
*nality,  his  avoidance  of  beaten  tracks  and  conventional 
grooves.  His  works  are  stamped  with  a  hall-mark  that  dis- 
tinguishes his  sterling  qualities  from  any  others,  and  he  has 
no  more  chosen  to  imitate  any  particular  style  than  it  will  be 
possible  for  others  to  appropriate  his. 

The  public  of  both  continents  is  now  impatiently  awaiting 
a  new  volume  fropi  the  gifted  pen  that  has  already  given  the 
world  so  rich  an  intellectual  feast.  The  golden  vein  cannot 
bp  exhausted,  the  muse  must  not  be  silent,  for  it  is  more  espe- 
cially to  the  aristocracy  of  talent  and  genius  that  the  motto 
applies,  "  Noblesse  oblige," 

M.  S.  V.  DE  v.,  in  Belgravia. 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM. 

I  s^ree  with  Charles  Lamb  :  "  Everybody  should  have  a 
hobb)%"  even  though,  lik€  Lamb's  friend  John  Tipp,  that 
hobby  should  be  only  a  fiddle.  John  Tipp  of  the  old  South 
Sea  house,  Elia  tells  us,  "  thought  an  accountant  the  greatest 
character  in  the  world,  and  himself  the  greatest  accountant 
in  it.  And  John  was  not  without  his  hobby.  The  fiddle  re- 
lieved his  vacant  hours  " — as  it  has  done  those  of  wiser  and 
greater  men  than  John  Tipp.  I  could  point  at  this  moment 
to  one  of  the  most  valuable  and  hard-worked  of  public  ser- 
vants who  found  in  his  hobby,  a  fiddle,  "  refreshment  and 
almost  rest "  during  the  sixty  years  of  his  busy  and  most  use- 
ful official  life,  and  now,  at  upwards  of  fourscore,  finds  in  it  a 
pleasant  change  from  that  "  arrear  of  reading  "  which  in  his 
well-earned  leisure  he  is  trying  to  reduce. 

More  fortunate  than  John  Tipp,  I  have  had  more  than  one 
hobby.     How  we  get  our  hobbies  is  matter  of  curious  specu- 


638  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,. 

lation.  Some,  I  suspect*,  are  born  with  us,  and  we  are  in- 
doctrinated with  others  from  accidental  circumstances,  while 
my  chief  hobby  was,  I  think,  the  result  of  that  beautiful  system 
of  compensation  on  the  part  of  providence  of  wliich,  as  we 
pass  through  life,  we  see  so  many  proofs. 

I  was  always  so  extremely  short-sighted  that  I  was  quite 
unfitted  to  take  part  in  the  majority  of  those  athletic  sports, 
such  as  cricket,  in  which  boys  delight.  Indeed,  there  was 
only  one  branch  of  them  in  which  I  was  at  all  an  adept,  and 
in  these  refined  days  I  almost  blush  to  refer  to  it :  I  was  said 
to  handle  the  gloves  very  nicely. 

The  consequence  of  my  infirmity  was,  that  almost  as  soon 
as  I  ceased  to  be  one  of  the  "  spelling"  public  I  became  one 
of  the  reading*  public ;  and  on  our  holidays  at  school,  instead 
of  investing  my  small  weekly  allowance  at  the  "  tuck  shop," 
I  used  to  borrow  from  the  small  circulating  library  in  the 
neighborhood  materials  for  an  afternoon's  reading.  I  suppose 
I  began  with  the  "  Mysteries  of  Udolpho,"  the  "  Scottish 
Chiefs,"  etc. ;  but  before  I  left  school  in  1819I  had  read  and 
re-read  all  Scott's  novels  that  had  then  appeared. 

When  I  left  school,  and,  by  the  kindness  of  the  late  Lord 
Farnborough,^  received  an  appointment  in  the  Civil  Service, 
my  wise  and  good  father,  disregarding  Shakespeare's  con- 
demnation of  "  home-keeping  youths,"  and  believing  that  a 
youth  who  was  released  from  his  office  and  official  restraints  at 
four  o'clock  there  was  no  place  like  home  to  keep  him  out  of 
mischief,  gave  up  to  me  the  small  room  in  which  his,  if  limited, 
still  well-selected  library  of  the  best  English  writers  was 
shelved,  and  made  it  mine,  the  room  of  which  I  was  hence- 
forth to  be  lord  and  master,  with  full  liberty  to  invite  to  me 
there  and  at  all  times  such  friends  as  I  pleased.  I  can  never 
be  too  grateful  for  this  thoughtful  kindness.  Perhaps  my 
tendency  to  very  varied  if  not  omnivorous  reading  may  be 
attributed  to  the  fact  that  my  father,  who  was  a  diligent  readeK 
of  the  Edinburgh  and  Quarterly  Reviews,  had  a  complete  set' 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOICWORM.  639 

of  them ;  and  these,  with  the  Literary  Gazette,  which  I  began 
to  take  in  on  my  own  account,  became  great  favorites  with  me. 

My  father  was  an  inveterate  walker,  and  yet  so  punctual  a 
man  of  business  that  I  do  not  believe  during  the  many  years 
he  held  his  then  office  he  was  ever  five  minutes  after  ten,  or 
ever  missed  his  liour's  walk  before  ten,  or  his  hour's  walk 
after  four;  and  he  strongly  enjoined  me  to  keep  up  my  health 
by  regular  daily  pedestrian  exercise. 

Hence  my  two  hobbies,  my  love  of  books,  my  love  of  walk- 
ing, made  up  my  great  hobby  which  I  venture  to  designate 
bookstalling,  and  to  the  pursuit  of  that  hobby  I  owe  not  only 
much  enjoyment,  but  in  a  great  measure  the  rather  curious 
collection  of  literary  treasures  which  during  fifty  years  of 
bookstalling  I  have  gathered  round  me.  I  wonder  how  many 
hundred  miles  I  walked  during  the  fifty  years  from  i8i9to 
1869,  during  which  I  pursued,  with  greater  or  less  activity,  my 
gleanings  from  old  bookstalls. 

Fortunately  for  me  catalogues  are  now  showered  upon  us 
thick  as  autumnal  leaves  in  Vallombrosa ;  though  I  agree 
with  a  late  dear  friend  of  mine  who  was  the  exception  to 
Chaucer's  dictum  that  the  greatest  clerks  are  not  the  wisest 
men,  arid  was  at  once  the  greatest  clerk  and  the  wisest  man  I 
ever. knew,  and  who,  speaking  to  me  once  on  the  formation 
of  a  library,  expressed  his  belief  that  the  majority  of  his  most 
valuable  books  had  been  picked  by  him  from  the  shelves  of 
the  booksellers,  and  not  ordered  from  their  catalogues,  since 
from  a  catalogue  you  only  get  the  title  of  a  book,  often  very 
imperfect  and  deceptive,  while  turning  over  the  pages  of  the 
book  itself  for  a  few  minutes  shows  its  scope  and  object  suf- 
ficiently to  enable  you  to  decide  how  far  it  is  worth  your 
buying. 

After  all,  a  bookstall  is  only  an  open  shop  where  you  can, 
without  troubling  the  owner,  turn  over  such  volumes  as  may 
strike  your  fancy;  and  with  this  additional  advantage,  that 
the   books  are  not  only  generally  priced,  but  the   outdoor 


640  X         THE  LIBRAE  V  MAGAZINE, 

prices  are,  as  a  rule,  considerably  lower  than  those  penciled 
in  mysterious  symbols,  known  only  to  the  bookseller,  on  the 
shelves  of  his  shop.  It  is  matter  for  curious  speculation  bow 
many  of  the  "  rarissimi "  in  the  famous  Roxburghe  Library, 
which  sold  in  181 2  for  upwards  of  ;^22,ooo,and  would  in  these 
days  have  produced  three  times  the  amount,  had  been  picked 
up  by  the  noble  duke  from  the  bookstalls  which  he  delig-hted 
to  visit.  For  he  did  visit  them,  and,  with  the  view  of  him- 
self bringing  home  any  rarities  he  might  pick  up,  he  had  the 
hind  pocket  of  his  overcoat  made  large  enough  to  contain  a 
small  folio.  This  I  state  on  the  authority  of  one  who  knew 
him  well,  the  late  Francis  Douce. 

A  great  portion  of  the  library  of  the  late  Lord  Macaulay 
had  been  collected  by  the  same  means.  I  remember  meeting 
him  many  years  since,  very  far  east,  and  his  then  telling  me 
that  he  had  been  looking  over  the  bookstalls  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  the  City  Road  and  Whitechapel. 

I  remember  the  great  historian  telling  me  the  curious  inci- 
dent which  put  him  in  possession  of  some  French  memoirs 
of  which  he  had  long  been  endeavoring  to  secure  a  copy,  but 
without  success.  He  was  strolling  down  Holywell  Street 
when  he  saw  in  a  bookseller's  window  a  volume  of  Muggle- 
tonian  tracts.  Having  gone  in,  examined  the  volume,  and 
agreed  to  buy  it,  he  tendered  a  sovereign  in  payment.  The 
bookseller  had  not  change,  but  said,  if  he  (Mr.  Macaulay) 
would  just  keep  an  eye  on  the  shop,  he  would  step  out  and  get 
Jt.  I  remember  the  shop  well  and  the  civil  fellow  who  kept  it. 
His  name,  I  think,  was  Hearle,  and  he  had  some  relatives  of 
the  same  name  who  had  shops  in  the  same  street.  This  shop 
was  at  the  west  end  of  the  street  and  backed  on  to  Wjxh 
Street ;  and  at  the  back  was  a  small  recess,  lighted  by  a  few 
panes  of  glass  generally  somewhat  obscured  by  the  dust  of 
ages.  While  Macaulay  was  looking  round  the  shop  a  ray  of 
sunshine  fell  through  this  little  window  on  four  little  duodeci- 
mo volumes  bound  in  vellum.    He  pulled  out  one  of  them 


\ 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM,  641 

to  see  what  the  work  was,  and  great  was  his  surprise  and 
delight  at  finding  these  four  volumes  were  the  very  French 
memoirs  of  which  he 'had  been  in  search  for  many  years. 

Macaulay  spared  no  pains,  no  personal  exertion  to  secure 
a  book  he  wanted.  I  remember  a  bookseller  who  resided  in 
Great  Turnstile  telling  me,  many  years  ago,  that  one  morning, 
when  he  began  to  take  down  his  shutters,  he  saw  a  stout-built 
gentleman  stumping  up  and  down  with  his  umbrella,  who,  as 
soon  as  the  shop  was  fairly  opened,  walked  in  and  asked  for  a 
book  which  was  in  the  catalogue  which  the  bookseller  had 
sent  out  the  day  before.  He  eventually  found  out  that  the 
purchaser  was  Mr.  Macaulay,  who  had  come  all  the  way  from 
Kensington,  thus  early,  in  order  to  secure  the  volume  in  ques- 
tion. 

Let  me  go  back  for  a  moment  to  Holjrwell  Street,  and  tell 
another  story  about   Hearle's   shop  there,  outside  of  which 
there  was  always  a  goodly  array  of  books  of  all  kinds.    A  dear 
and  accomplished  friend  of  mine,  who  took  special  interest  in 
the  political  history  of  the  closing  half  of  the  last  century, 
had  long  been  anxious  to  secure  a  copy  of  a  certain  collection 
of  political  tracts,  published  either  by  Almon  or  Debrett,  the 
precise  title  of  which  I  do  not  at  this  minute  recollect.    There 
was  not  a  bookseller  in  the  United  Kingdom  known  to  have 
a  large  stock  who  had  not  been  applied  to  for  a  copy ;  and  a 
literary  friend  of  his  who  was  traveling  in  the  United  States 
(to  which  so  many,  books  of  this  character  are  consigned), 
was  commissioned  to  secure  a  copy  at  any  price.     But  all  was 
in  vain.    The  anxious  searcher  after  the  book  in  question  had 
given  up  all  hopes  of  obtaining  a  copy  when,  strolling  one 
afternoon  through  Holywell  Street  and  casting  his  eyes  on 
the  volumes  ranged  outside  Hearle's  shop,  he  was  startled  and 
delighted  to  see  the  long-sought-for  collection  of  tracts.     I 
need  scarcely  add  that  he  at  once  secured  the  precious  vol- 
umes, ahd,,although  not  provided  with  the  capacious  pockets 
of  Roxburghe's  Duke,  carried  them  away  with  him  in  triumph. 
L.  M. — 21 


642  THE  IIBRAR  V  MA  GAZINE, 

It  was  perhaps  two  or  three  years  after  I  was  first  attacked 
with  bibliomania,  and,  adopting  to  a  certain  extent  Chaucer's 
opinion— 

That  out  of  olde  bookes  in  good  faithe 
Cometh  all  this  new  science  that  men  lere — 

had  begun  to  turn  my  long  walks  to  good  account  among  the 
bookstalls,  that  I  had  the  good  fortune  to  meet  Leigh  Hunt 
several  times  at  dinner  at  the  house  of  a  mutual  friend.  I 
shall  never  forget  the  delight  with  which  I  listened  to  his 
after-dinner  talk,  especially  the  first  time  I  met  him.  Of 
course  he  monopolized  the  talk.  On  that  occasion  his  dis- 
course was  nearly  akin  to  Elia's  quaint  and  charming  essay 
"  On  Grace  before  Meat,"  and  he  discoursed  on  the  propriety 
of  "  a  grace  before  Milton,  a  grace  before  Shakespeare,  and  a 
devotional  exercise  proper  to  be  saic^  before  reading  the 
*  Faery  Queene.' "  But  I  remember  I  was  somewhat  startled  by 
a  hint  as  to  "grace,"  not  only  before  such  super-sensual  enjoy- 
ments as  those  which  I  have  named,  but  before  others  of  less 
intellectual  character  and  more  allied  to  what  I  heard  Crabbe 
Robinson  describe  as  ''the  animality  of  our  nature."  When 
I  read  lately  what  his  and  my  old  friend  Cowden  Clarke  said 
of  his  conversational  powers,  I  felt  that  he  had  done  Leigh 
Hunt  no  more  than  justice.  "  Melodious  in  tone,  alluring  in 
accent,  eloquent  in  choice  of  words,  Leigh  Hunt's  talk  was 
as  delicious  to  listen  to  as  rarest  music." 

I  remember  on  one  of  these  memorable  occasions  being  star- 
tled by  what  seemed  to  me  "a  parlous  heresy  "  on  the  part  of 
Leigh  Hunt.  The  subject  of  his  after-dinner  oration  on  that 
occasion  was  books,  and  old  books  especially;  and  in  the 
course  of  his  varied  criticisms  and  opinions  he  declared  "  no 
one  had  ever  found  an)rthing  worth  having  in  the  *  sixpenny 
box '  at  a  bookstall." 

When  he  had  wound  up,  and  there  was  a  lull  in  the  1 
sation  which  followed,  I  ventured  to  dissent  from  this  < 
and  though  I  am  bound,  in  justice  to  the  eloquent  poet. 


rx^nver- 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM.  643 

he  did  not  snub  the  short-sighted  nervous  stripling  who  had 
!  ventured  to  differ  from  him,  the  objection  urged  against  his 
heterodoxy  only  confirmed  him  in  it.  I  was  recently  reminded 
of  this  incident  by  coming  across  one  of  the  very  books  which 
I  had  so  picked  up  out  of  a  "  sixpenny  box  "  and  had  quoted 
in  support  of  my  view — an  early  copy  of  Thomas  Randolph's 
•' Aristippus,  or  the  Jovial  Philosopher." 

"  Never  find  anything  at  a  bookstall  in  the  *  sixpenny  box ' " ! 
A  greater  mistake  was  never  made.  Some  years  ago  a  very 
able  critic  was  stopped  in  the  preparation  of  an  article  on  a 
very  interesting  historical  question  for  want  of  a  certain  pam- 
phlet on  the  subject  which,  when  published  some  twenty  or 
thirty  )'^ears  before,  had  excited  great  attention.  All  the  book- 
sellers had  been  canvassed  without  success.  At  last  he  adver- 
tised for  it,  naming,  as  the  price  he  was  willing  to  give,  about 
as  many  shillings  as  it  was  worth  pence.  He  had  a  copy  within 
eight-and-forty  hours,  with  a  large  **6d."  penciled  on  the  title- 
page,  showing  that  it  had  been  picked  out  of  one  of  these 
despised  receptacles  for  curiosities  of  literature. 

Not  find  anything  worth  having  in  the  "  sixpenny  box  "  at 
a  bookstall !  Psha  !  When  the  collected  edition  of  Defoe's 
works  was  piiblished  some  thirty  years  ago,  it  was  determined 
that  the  various  pieces  inserted  in  it  should  be  reprinted  from 
the  editions  of  them  superintended  by  Defoe  himself.  There 
was  one  tract  which  the  editor  had  failed  to  find  at  the  British 
Museum  or  any  other  public  library,  and  which  he  had  sought 
for  in  vain  in  "  the  Row"  or  any  bookseller's  within  the  reach 
of  ordinary  West-end  mortals.  Somebody  suggested  that  he 
should  make  a  pilgrimage  to  Old  Street,  St.  Luke's,  and  per- 
haps Brown  might  have  a  copy.  Old  Brown,  as  he  was  famil- 
iarly called,  had  great  knowledge  of  books  and  book  rarities, 
although  perhaps  he  was  more  widely  known  for  the  extensive 
stock  of  manuscript  sermons  which  he  kept  indexed  accord- 
f^^ing  to  texts,  and  which  he  was  ready  to  lend  or  sell  as  his  cus- 


644  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA  GA ZINE, 

text  "Knbv/  ye  not  that  there  is  a  prince  and  a  great  man 
fallen  this  day  in  Israel?'  he  is  reported  to  have  sold  on  the 
death  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  and  it  is  said  he  might  have 
disposed  of  hundreds  more  if  he  had  had  them  in  stock.  But  to 
go  back  to  my  story.  The  editor  inquired  of  Brown  whether 
he  had  a  copy  of  Defoe's  tract.  "  No,"  said  Brown,  "  I  have 
not,  and  I  don't  know  where  you  are  likely  to  find  one.  But 
if  you  do  meet  with  one,  you  will  have  to  pay  pretty  hand- 
somely for  it."  "  I  am  prepared  to  pay  a  fair  price  for  it/'  said 
the  would-be  customer,  and  left  the  shop.  Now  old  Brown  had 
a  "  sixpenny  box  "  outside  the  door,  and  he  had  such  a  keen 
eye  to  business,  that  I  believe,  if  there  was  a  box  in  London 
which  would  bear  out  Leigh  Hunt's  statement,  it  was  that  box 
in  Old  Street.  But  as  the  customer  left  the  shop,  his  eye  fell 
on  the  box,  turned  over  the  rubbish  in  it,  and  at  last  selected 
a  volume  which  he  found  there.  "  I'll  pay  you  for  this  out  of 
the  box ! "  "  Thank  you,  sir,"  said  Brown,  taking  the  proffered 
sixpence;  *' but,  by  the  bye,  what  is  it.^"  "It  is  a  tract  by 
Defoe,"  was  the  answer,  to  old  Brown's  chagrin.  For  it  was 
the  very  work  of  which  the  purchaser  was  in  search.  Who, 
after  this,  will  back  Leigh  Hunt's  unfounded  dogma  that  you 
will  never  find  anything  worth -having  in  a  sixj)enny  box  at  a 
bookstall  ? 

But  there  are  other  hiding-places  than  those  of  which  I 
have  just  Been  speaking,  where  curious  out-of-the-way  books 
ma)'^  be  found.  At  small  brokers'  shops,  one  drawer  of  a 
chest  is  frequently  left  open  to  show  that  it  contains  books 
for  sale.  I  have  before  me  at  this  moment  a  curious  little 
black-letter  i6mo,  containing  early  English  translations  of 
Erasmus,  which  a  shilling  rescued  from  such  company  as  it 
was  then  in. 

As  the  accounts  of  these  curious  English  versions  in  Lown- 
des are  very  imperfect,  I  venture  to  give  a  short  notice  of 
them.  They  are  four  in  number,  the  first  and  fourth  beii^ 
unfortunately  imperfect. 


A 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOQKWORM.  645 

No.  I  is.the  first  part  of  the  "  Garden  of  Wisdom  "  selected 
by  Richard  Taverner.  It  wants  the  title  and  first  four  folios, 
and  ends  on  verso  of  folio  xlviii.  with  the  words  "  Here  endeth 
the  fyrst  booke  "  and  '*  These  bookes  are  to  be  sold  at  the 
west  dore  of  Poules  by  Wyllyam  Telotson." 

No.  2  is  "  The  Seconde  Booke  of  the  Garden  of  Wysedome, 
wherein  are  conteyned  wytty,  pleasaunt  and  nette  sayenges 
of  renowned  personages,  collected  by  Rycharde  Tauerner. 
Anno  MDXXXIX.  Cum  privilegioad  imprimendum  solum," 
and  ends  on  the  verso  of  folio  48  "  Prynted  at  London  by 
Richard  Bankes.    Cum  privilegio  ad  imprimendum  solum.'* 

No.  3  is  '•  Flores  aliquot  Sententiarum  ex  variis  collecti 
scriptoribus.  The  Flowers  of  Sentces  [.wVr]  gathered  out  of 
sundry  wryters  by  Erasmus  in  Latine  and  Englished  by  Richard 
Tauerner.  Huic  libello  non  male  conveniunt  Mimi  illi  Pub- 
liani  nuper  ab  eodem  Richardo  uersi.  Londini  ex  aedibus 
Richardi  Tauerner,  anno  MDXL.,"  and  ends  on  verso  of  B. 
iii.,  "  Printed  in  Flete  strete  very  diligently  under  the  correc- 
tion of  the  selfe  Richard  Tauerner  by  Richard  Bankes." 

No.  4,  the  last,  is  "Proverbes  and  Adagies  gathered  out  of 
the  Chiliades  of  Erasmus  by  Richarde  Tauerner.  With  newe 
additions  as  well  of  Latyn  proverbes  as  of  Englysshe.  Ed- 
wardus  Whytchurche  excudebat  anno  MDXLV."  This  is 
unfortunately  imperfect,  wanting  all  after  folio  Ixx. 

A  quaint  writer  is  Master  Richard  Taverner,  and  his  Eras- 
mus tracts  repay  the  attention  xA  students  of  early  English. 

My  next  prize  from  a  similar  source  was  one  of  greater 
curiosity  and  value.  As  I  was  hurrying  to  my  office  one 
morning,  some  forty  years  ago,  I  espied  on  the  top  of  a  chest 
of  drawers  outside  a  broker's  shop,  opposite  the  Royal  Mews 
in.  Pimlico,  a  pile  of  books.  I  looked  over  them,  but  there 
was  only  one  which  interested  me — a  small  thin  folio,  which 
on  opening  proved  to  be  an  early  Latin  manuscript.  The 
worthy  broker  said  it  was  "very  old  and  very  curious,"  and 
asked  a  larger  sum  for  it  than  I  was  prepared  to  pay  without 


646  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

a  fuller  examination  than  I  had  then  time  to  give  to  it.  So  I 
left  it,  but  was  vexed  with  myself  for  the  rest  of  the  day'that 
I  had  done  so,  fearing  it  might  have  been  sold  when  I  return- 
ed homewards  in  the  afternoon.  Fortunately  it  was  still  on 
the  top  of  the  drawers  when  I  returned ;  and  although  I  had 
until  then  never  indulged  in  the  luxury  of  buying  manu- 
scripts, the  result  of  my  further  examination  was  to  show  me 
that  the  broker  was  right,  and  that  the  manuscript  was  curious 
as  well  as  old,  and  I  risked  a  sovereign,  or  a  sovereign  and  a 
half,  which  was  the  price  asked  for  it,  and  secured  it,  as  it  con- 
tained a  collection  of  Latin  stories  with  moralizations;  and  I 
came  to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  an  early  manuscript  oi  the 
world-renowned  "  Gesta  Romanorum."  But  m}'^  learned  friend^ 
Mr.  Thomas  Wright,  a  great  authority  upon  all  such  matters, 
who  saw  it  soon  after  I  had  bought  it,  pronounced  the  manu- 
script to  be  of  the  thirteenth  century,  and  confirmed  my  opin- 
ion as  to  the  interest  and  value  of  it,  for  it  was  obviously  an 
English  collection,  the  scene  of  many  of  the  tales  being  laid 
in  this  country.  At  his  suggestion  I  transcribed  a  number  of 
the  tales  and  sent  them  to  that  interesting  German  antiquarian 
journal,  edited  by  Moriz  Haupt  and  Heinrich  Hoffman,  enti- 
tled Altdeutsche  Blatter  (Leipzig,  1836-40),  the  precursor  of 
Wright  and  Halliwell's  curious  collection,  the  Relil[iuiae  An- 
tiquae.  The  tales  so  transcribed  will  be  found  at  pp.  74-82  of 
the  second  volume.  My  impression  is  that  when  transferred 
to  the  British  Museum,  which  it  was  at  the  earnest  solicitation 
of  Sir  Frederic  Madden,  the  manuscript  was  ascertained  to  be 
one  of  Odo  de  Cerington.  But  on  this  I  cannot,  after  so 
many  years,  speak  with  certainty.  But  I  must  be  pardoned  if 
I  make  a  short  digression  before  I  tell  the  story  of  my  third 
prize  from  a  broker's  shop. 

In  the  year  1846  I  addressed  a  letter  to  the  editor  of  a  well- 
known  periodical  suggesting  an  article  which  I  thought 
might  be  suitable  to  it,  and  in  consequence  of  his  invitation 
called  upon  him  at  his  office  to  talk  the  matter  over  with  him- 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM,  ^A7 

That  was  a  day"lapidi  candidiore' notare."  It  was  the  first 
time  I  met  one  who  became  one  of  my  most  dear  and  most 
honored  friends.  How  often  have  I  regretted  that  I  had  not 
known  him  before !  At  that  interview  1  was  charmed  and 
struck  by  his  strong  common  sense  aud  thorough  right- 
mindedness  ;  but  it  was  only  when  it  was  my  privilege  to 
know  him  intimately  that  I  became  aware  that,  great  as  were 
the  good  qualities  in  him  which  I  had  at  once  recognized, 
they  were  but  as  straw  in  the  balance  as  compared  with  his 
kindly  and  affectionate  nature.  Advisedly  I  do  not  mention 
his  name,  that  1  may  not  be  suspected,  of  self-glorification. 
Those  who  know  me,  and  who  knew  the  excellent  man  to 
whom  I  refer,  will  easily  recognize  him,  and  will  judge  the 
emotion  with  which,  after  our  friendship  had  extended  over 
some  twenty  years,  I  read  these  touching  lines  from  his  ex- 
cellent son :  "  My  dear  father  loved  you  too  well  for  me  to 
let  you  learn  from  the  newspapers  that  he  died  this  morning." 
Peace  to  his  memory.  It  is  very  dear  to  me. 
'  At  this  our  first  interview  our  business  matter  was  soon 
settled,  and  after  a  long  gossip  on  books  and  men  I  left  the 
oflace  quite  delighted  with  the  acquaintance  which  I  had 
made. 

My  next  interview  with  him  was  at  a  bookstall  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  Drury  Lane,  which,  after  a  long  and  pleasant  chat, 
ended  with  his  inviting  me  to  call  upon  him  and  renew  our 
gossip  at  home,  an  invitation  as  cordially  accepted  as  it  was 
heartily  given.  As  I  soon  found  my  old  friend,  for  he  was 
nearly  twenty  years  my  senior,  interested  in  many  points  of 
literary  history,  on  which  I  was  curious  and  he  learned,  my 
visits  became  very  frequent,  and  to  me  very  instructive.  Who 
was  Junius.^  was  one  of  these,  and  I  shall  not  readily  forget 
the  pleasure  with  which  he  one  day  received  a  copy  of  an 
early  Wheble  edition  of  the  letters,  which  he  had  long  been 
looking^  for  without  success,  and  which  I  had  a  day  or  two 
before  picked  out  of  a  "  sixpenny  box." 


648  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MAGAZINE. 

A  few  weeks  later  it  was  my  good  luck  to  pick  up  a  Junius 
tract  which  my  old  friend  had  not  got,  and  which  he  was  de- 
lighted to  see ;  but  before  I  left  him  he  said  to  me,  with  that 
characteristic  frankness  which  was  one  of  his  charms:  "I 
can't  tell  you  the  pleasure  you  give  me  by  thinking  of  me  in 
this  way,  and  how  pleased  I  am  to  get  these  additions  to  my 
collection.  But  you  can  double  my  obligation  to  you."  I 
stared,  and  he  explained.  It  would  be  by  letting  him  pay  for 
whatever  I  did  so  pick  up  for  him.  I  saw  it  was  his  wish,  so 
consented  at  once  upon  condition  that  if  I  bought  him  any 
book  which  he  already  possessed  he  would  at  once  tell  me  so, 
and  I  would  keep  that  for  my  own  collection.  The  treaty  was 
at  once  concluded,  and  from  that  time  I  gave  him  the  choice 
of  every  Junius  book  I  got  hold  of. 

No,  not  every  one.  My  "Vellum  Junius,"  which  came  off  a 
stall  in  Maiden  Lane,  and  which  Joseph  Parkes  persuaded 
himself  was  the  veritable  vellum  copy  bound  for  Junius,  but 
which  is  more  than  doubtful.  I  must  some  day,  but  not  now. 
tell  the  story  of  Lord  Brougham  showing  that  copy  to  the 
late  Lord  Lansdowne,  and  of  the  curious  conversation  that 
followed. 

But  to*retum  to  books  and  brokers.  One  summer's  even- 
ing, strolling  along  the  Blackf  riars  Road,  after  a  fruitless  search 
for  literary  treasures  in  the  New  Cut,  I  saw  a  few  books  at  a 
broker's,  and  on  turning  them  over  I  found  a  quarto  volume 
containing  five  tracts  connected  with  the  charge  made  by 
Lord  Sandwich  against  Wilkes  of  having  written  the  "  Elssay 
on  Woman,"  when  there  is,  I  fear,  little  doubt  that  he  must 
then  have  known,  as  well  as  know  now,  that  that  infamous 
production  was  written  by  Potter,  son  of  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury.  Of  course  I  purchased  the  volume,  and  a  few 
days  after  took  it  to  my  old  friend,  who  was  a  great  admirer 
of  John  Wilkes  and  knew  more  about  him,  his  real  character, 
foibles,  weaknesses,  and  strong  religious  feelings,  than  I 
believed  at  that  time  did  any  half-dozen  men  in  England  put 
tog^ether.  -      ' 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM.  649 

I  had  determined,  as  I  went  along,  that  on  this  occasion  I 
would  have  the  pleasure  of  giving  him  a  book  which  would, 
I  was  sure,  delight  him.  He  was  delighted  at  the  sight  of  it, 
and  as  he  turned  over  the  leaves  kept  asking  "  Where  did 
you  pick  it  up  ?  What  did  you  give  foi  it  ?  "  **  You  shall  know 
all  about  it  if  you  will  let  me  give  it  to  you,"  was  my  answer. 
He  consented,  and  I  don't  know  which  of  the  two  was  the 
more  pleased ;  and  when  I  told  him  where  I  had  found  it  and 
the  price — eighteenpence ! — he  very  irreverently  hinted  that  I 
had  the  luck  of  the  Prince  of  Darkness  as  well  as  my  own. 

But  I  was  not  always  blessed  with  that  "  joint-stock  luck  " 
with  which  I  was  credited.  More  than  once  have  I  been  in- 
terrupted in  the  course  of  my  small  literary  efforts  by  my 
inability-  to  act  up  to  the  wise  suggestion  of  one  of  great 
experience  who  laid  it  down  as  a  rule  "not  to  take  anything 
for  granted,'*  in  consequence  of  failing  to  get  sight  of  the 
-  particular  book  which  would  have  settled  some  point  at  issue, 
and  this  not  always  a  rare  book.  For  instance,  one  evening 
wanting  to  see  the  original  of  a  passage  translated  from  one 
of  the  *'  Colloquies "  of  Erasmus,  1  was  first  annoyed  at  not 
being  able  to  lay  my  hands  on  my  own  copy,  and,  secondly, 
still  more  annoyed  when,  as  time  was  an  object,  I  started  off 
at  once  to  Hol5rwell  Street,  sure,  as  I  thought,  to  find  one  at 
Poole's,  or  if  he  should  fail,  which  is  rarely  the  case,  at  one 
of  his  neighbors* :  but  neither  from  Poole  nor  any  of  his 
brother  booksellers  there,  nor  Bumstead  nor  Baldock  in 
Holbom,  nor  anywhere,  could  I  get  a  copy  of  this  compara- 
tively common  book,  and  I  returned  home  re  infecta.  When 
I  afterwards  came  across  my  own  copy,  my  interest  in  the 
point  had  vanished. 

In  my  early  days  of  book-hunting  there  was  no  book  more 
frequently  to  be  met  with,  at  prices  varying  from  one  shilling 
to  half  a  crown,  than  Theobald's  "  Shakespeare  Restored." 
But  when,  interested  in  the  quarrel  between  Pope  and  Theo- 
bald and  the  merits  of  their  respective  editions  of  Shakespeare 


650  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

both  of  which  I  bad,  I  wanted,  in  order  to  investigate  the 
matter  thoroughly,  to  get  a  copy  of  "  Shakespeare  Restored/' 
I  Runted  London  through,  I  might  almost  say,  in  vain ;  for 
the  only  copy  I  found  was  in  the  possession  of  one  who  asked 
at  least  ten  times  as  much  as  it  was  worth,  and  wanted  to 
make  a  favor  of  parting  with  it  at  that  price.  I  declined  to 
accept  his  favor,  and  have  now  a  nice  copy  at  a  tithe  of  what 
he  asked  me. 

But  a  marked  change  in  the  character  of  the  stock  of  every 
bookseller  has  taken  place  during  the  last  half-century.  No 
longer  does 

The  folio  Aldus  load  their  bending  shelves. 

Though  dapper  Elzevirs,  like  fairy  elves, 

Show  their  light  forms  amidst  the  well-gilt  twelves. 

I  do  not  believe  that  at  the  present  day  twenty-five  per  cent 
of  the  quartos,  certainly  not  of  the  folios,  are  to  be  seen  on 
their  shelves  compared  with  what  there  were  formerly. 

The  explanation  given  to  me  by  many  dealers  in  old  books 
some  six  or  seven  years  since,  when  I  was  looking  out  for  a 
certain  folio,  which  I  remember  as  by  no  means  a  rare  book, 
was  that  these  large  books  took  up  too  much  room  in  their 
shops,  that  now  nobody  liked  large  books,  especially  folios, 
and  that  what  had  not  gone  to  America  had  been  what  is 
technically  called  "  wasted,"  i.  e.  sold  to  the  buttershops.  The 
folio  to  which  I  have  just  referred  is  Nalson's  "  True  Copy  of 
the  Journal  of  the  High  Court  of  Justice  for  the  Tryal  of  King 
Charles  I.  as  it  was  read  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  attested 
under  the  hand  of  Phelps,  Clerk  to  that  infamous  Court.'* 

Until  1872,  when  I  published  in  Notes  and  Queries  a  little 
paper  entitled  "  The  Death  Warrant  of  Charles  the  First :  An- 
other Historical  Doubt,'*  I  do  not  know  of  a  writer  on  the 
subject  of  the  death  of  that  monarch  who  was  aware  that  the 
warrant  for  his  execution — ^a  strip  of  parchment  measuring 
some  eighteen  inches  wide  by  ten  deep,  on  which  there  are 
about  a  dozen  lines  of  writing  and  some  threescore  seals  and 
signatures — a  document  familiar  to  everybody  from  the  nu- 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM^  '  65 1 

merous  facsimiles  which  have  been  made  of  it — a  document 
second  to  none  in  existence  in  interest  and  importance — brief 
as  it  is,  abounds  with  erasures,  some  of  them  in  passages  of 
vital  importance. 

Having  repeatedly  seen  this  warrant,  I  had  long  been  aware 
of  this -fact,  and  I  cannot  now  say  positively  what  it  was  that 
determined  me  to  see  if  \  could  throw  any  light  on  the  origin 
of  these  erasures.  My  impression  is,  that  while  pointing  them 
out  to  somebody  to  whom  I  was  showing  the  warrant,  the 
thought  suddenly  occurred  to  me  that  seeing  how  short  the 
document  was,  and  looking  at  the  erasures,  I  came  to  the  con- 
clusion in  my  own  mind — which  was  afterwards  confirmed  by 
an  experienced  public  writer — that  it  would  have  taken  less 
time  to  write  out  another  fair  copy  of  it  than  ta  make  the 
erasures  and  corrections  which  now  appear  upon  it. 

I  knew,  of  course,  that  Nalson  was  the  great  authority  to 
be  consulted  with  respect  to  the  proceedings  of  the  so-called 
High  Court  of  Justic  j  ;  but  although  I  have  Disraeli's  Com- 
mentaries and  many  other  works  connected  with  Charles  the 
first,  I  had  not  Nalson.  Neither  had  the  library  of  the  House 
of  Lords  nor  that  of  the  House  of  Commons.  I  consoled  my- 
self with  th6  thought  I  shall  be  sure  to  find  it  at  the  Athenae- 
um. No,  it  is  not  even  in  that  best  of  club  libraries.  Thence 
I  turned  to  Burlington  House — no  Nalson  in  the  library  of 
the  Society  of  Antiquaries.  I  next  tried  the  Royal  Institution, 
of  which  I  am  not  a  member,  but  by  the  courtesy  of  Mr.  Vin- 
cent, the  careful  editor  of  Haydn's  indispensable  "  Dictionary 
of  Dates,"  I  had  an  opportunity  of  running  my  eyes  over  the 
pages  of  Nalson  in  that  library. 

Now  I  am  something  like  the  boy  who  could  only  read  out 
of  his  own  book.  I  can  only  work  comfortably  in  my  own 
room  and  with  my  own  books  about,  and  what  I  had  seen  of 
Nalson  showed  me  pretty  clearly  that  if  I  were  to  go  thor- 
oughly into  the  inquiry  which  I  had  proposed  to  myself,  I  must 
secure  a  copy  of  that  book.     What  efforts  I  made  to  procurf 


652  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

one,  it  were  long  to  tell.  But,  alas  !  all  were  in  vain  ;  and 
probably  this  good  intention  would  have  been  added  to  the 
number  of  proverbial  paving-stones  which  1  have  laid  down, 
but  for  the  kindness  of  a  gentleman,  an  entire  stranger  to  me, 
who,  happening  to  hear  from  Salkeld,  the  worthy  and  intelli- 
gent Bookseller  of  Orange  Street,  Golden  Square,  that  I  was 
in  search  of  a  copy  of  Nalson,  said  he  had  one,  wanting  the 
portrait  and  plate  of  the  trial,  which  was  at  my  service.  That 
gentleman  was  the  late  Mr.  John  Sof)er  Streeter,  a  distin- 
guished medical  practitioner  of  Bloomsbury,  editor  of  the 
Icones  Obstretricae  of  Moreau,  and  other  valuable  works ;  and 
I  deeply  regret  that  this  public  recognition  of  his  thoughtful 
kindness  conies  too  late.    He  died  in  1875. 

This  act  of  courtesy  is  only  one  of  many  similar  kindnesses 
which  I  have  from  time  to  time  received;  and  lam  convinced 
that  what  Chaucer  said  in  his  noble  description  of  the  Scholar 
of  Oxenforde : — 

And  gladly  wolde  he  leme  and  gladly  teche — 

might  be  said,  with  a  slight  verbal  alteration,  of  all  true  lovers 
of  books : — 

Full  gladly  would  they  give  and  gladly  tak«. 

I  have  several  curious  old  German  books  given  me  some 
half  century  since  by  one  of  my  earliest  and  most  revered 
friends,  Francis  Douce ;  and  my  collection  of  books  in  con- 
nection with  Mrs.  Serres,  soi-disant  Princess  Olive  of  Cum- 
berland, owes  much  of  its  completeness  to  similar  acts  of 
considerate  courtesy.  I  am  indebted  for  more  than  one  of 
these  to  the  liberality  of  Mr.  William  Lee,  the  author  of  the 
interesting  "  Life  and  Newly  Discovered  Writings  of  Daniel 
Defoe."  My  kind  old  friend,  so  long  the  distinguished  heap 
of  the  British  Museum,  the  late  Sir  Henry  Ellis,  took  frMi  a 
volume  of  pamphlets  his  copy  of  the  "Princess  Olive's  Pre 
of  her  Legitimacy,"  inscribed  on  the  title-p^e  in  her 
writing  (I  copy  literatim)  "  with  the  Princesses*  respects  f  ox^ 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM.  653 

your  acceptance,"  and  to  the  last  page,  "  Princess  being  an 
present  at  Crawford  Street,  No.  7,  may  be  seen  at  one  anyy 
morning.**  I  am  indebted  for  several  others  to  gentlemen 
who  were  entire  strangers  to  me,  but  who  sympathized  with 
my  endeavors  to  discover  whether  there  was  any  fragment 
of  truth  in  the  claim  originated  by  Mrs.  Serres  and  afterwards 
brought  forward  by  Mrs.  Ryyes. 

Oddly  enough,  I  first  took  up  that  inquiry,  which  has 
resulted  in  what  a  noble  and  learned  lord  has  good-naturedly 
characterized  as  "  Serres  on  the  brain,"  in  consequence  of 
the  gift  from  Lord  Brougham,  when  at  a  visit  to  him  at 
Brougham  in  1858,  of  Mrs.  Ryves's  "  Appeal  for  Royalty,*' and 
was  encouraged  to  pursue  it  by  the  late  Lord  Chief  Baron 
Pollock  telling  me  how  much  he  envied  my  pointing  out  that 
the  certificate  of  Mrs.  Serres's  birth,  whose  mother,  it  should 
be  remembered,  was  the  daughter  of  a  Fellow  of  Trinity  who 
was  never  married,  by  a  Polish  princess  who  never  existed, 
en  Tuesday,  April  3, 1772,  must  clearly  be  a  forgery,  inasmuch 
as  the  3rd  of  April,  1772,  fell  on  a  Friday  and  not  on  a  Tues- 
day. The  mistake  of  the  writer  was  not  knowing  that  the 
old  style,  under  which  the  12th  of  April  would  have  been  on 
Tuesday,  was  altered  in  1752. 

But  asking  forgiveness  for  this  digression,  and  going  back 
to  the  matter  of  books — ^though,  for  obvious  reasons,  I  scarcely 
like  to  write  it — I  really  believe  it  is  almost  more  blessed  to 
give  than  to  receive.  There  is  nothing  more  delightful  than 
to  put  into  the  hands  of  a  book-loving  friend  a  volume  one 
feels  sure  he  will  prize  and  enioy. 

When  I  had  picked  up,  as  I  did  occasionally,  an  old  Caro- 
linian tract,  and  added  it  to  the  remarkable  collection  of  them 
-   which  my  almost  brother  John  Bruce  had  gathered  together, 
I  am  sure  his  satisfaction  could  not  exceed  mine ;  and  great 
^  ,       as  were  the  pleasure  and  heartiness  with  which  my  frequent 
i^^  correspondent  Professor  De  Morgan — whom  it  was  my  mis- 
^^^j  fortune  neverto  have  known  personally— expressed  his  thank^^ 

I 


6S4  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

for  two  or  three  early  books  on  arithmetic  which  I  had  dis- 
covered in  some  sixpenny  boxes,  and  added  to  his  collection,  I 
am  sure  I  was  as  much  pleased  as  he  was. 

It  is  undoubtedly  a  real  source  of  satisfaction  to  feel  that  a 
volume  which  has  any  special  interest  connected  with  it  is  in 
proper  keeping.  When,  on  the  evening  of  one  of  the  soirees 
given  by  the  President  of  the  Royal  Society,  I  had  rescued 
from  a  miserable  lot  of  dirty  old  books  in  a  back  slum  near 
Clare  Market  a  copy  of  Sprat's  "  History  of  the  Royal  Society," 
which  contained  unmistakable  evidence  that  it  had  once  be- 
longed to  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  what  was  more  natural  than  that 
on  that  evening  I  should  place  that  copy  in  the  hands  of  the 
-  noble  lord  who  then  held  the  office  which  Sir  Isaac  had  for- 
merly occupied,  and  that-  that  volume  should  find  a  home  in 
the  Society's  library? 

Again,  what  more  natural  than  that,  having,  as  the  result 
of  an  afternoon's  bookstalling,  brought  home  a  copy  of  Bish- 
op Burnet's  "  Funeral  Sermon  on  the  death  of  Queen  Anne," 
as  fresh  as  if  it  had  just  come  from  the  press,  I  should  place 
it  in  the  hands  of  Mr.  Macaulay,  whom  I  was  then  seeing 
almost  daily  in  my  room  at  the  House  of  Lords,  where  he  was 
working  up  materials  for  his  "  History  of  England  ";  and  I  had 
the  pleasant  duty  of  bringing  under  his  notice  the  records  of 
the  House,  which  had  not  then  been  calendared.  About  that 
time  I  should  have  given  him  another  interesting  book,  a 
Dublin  edition  of  a  certain  well-known  English  classic  which 
I  told  him  I  had  lately  secured.  He  thought  I  was  wrong  in 
my  impression  about  it.  So  in  the  course  of  a  few  days,  being 
anxious  to  set  myself  right,  when  he  had  seen  all  the  papers 
he  was  then  prepared  to  go  through,  and  near  about  to  leave, 
I  recalled  his  attention  to  the  book.  The  result  was  that  he 
poured  forth  an  oration  delicious  to  listen  to,  full  of  distinct 
proofs 

That  what's  impossible  can't  be. 
And  never,  never  comes  to  pass  ; 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM.  655 

that  no  such  book  containing  what  I  had  stated  it  did  contain 
could  exist ;  and  when  he  had  brought  his  brilliant  discourse 
to  an  end  shook  hands  and  bade  me  good-bye,  convinced,  I 
have  no  doubt,  in  his  own  mind,  that  he  had  convinced  me 
because,  in  the  face  of  all  he  had  said,  I  had  not  impudence 
sufficient,  even  if  he  had  waited,  to  pull  the  book  in  question 
out  of  that  pocket  in  which  I  had  brought  it  with  me  for  the 
purpose  of  giving  it  to  him.  I  would  have  given  much  to 
have  had  present  a  shorthand  writer  who  could  have  taken 
down  that  wonderful  specimen  of  Macaulay's  power  of  talk. 

I  never  heard  anything  at  all  to  be  compared  with  it  but 
once.  That  was  during  a  stroll  over  Weybridge  Common 
with  that  warm-hearted  friend  and  profound  scholar,  the  great 
Saxonist,  John  Mitchell  Kemble ;  when  he  descanted  upon 
his  great  theme,  the  Saxons  in  England,  the  nature  of.  the 
**  mark,"  and  other  cognate  points,  with  such  overpowering 
eloquence  that  I  could  scarcely  tear  myself  away  from  him 
when  the  trai»  came  that  was  to  bring  me  hack  to  London. 
I  remember  two  things  he  mentioned  on  that  day.  The  first 
was  that  he  never  wrote  down  a  single  line  of  any  paper  or 
boak-^the  "  Saxons  in  England  "  for  instance — until  the  paper 
or  book  was  arranged  and  composed  in  his  own  mind.  The 
second,  that. among  other  illustrations  ol  ancient  tenures,  for- 
est rights,  etc.,  which  he  had  picked  up  at  Addlestone  (where 
he  was  then  living,  and  to  which  the  old  forest  of  Windsor 
had  formerly  extended),  was  the  custom  of  deciding  how  far 
the  rights  of  the  owner  of  land  extended  into  the  stream,  on 
which  his  property  is  situated,  by  a  man  standing  on  the  brink 
with  one  foot  on  the  land  and  the  other  in  the  water  and 
throwing  a  tenpenny  hatchet  into  the  water;  where  the 
hatchet  fell  was  the  liipit.  This  he  had  learned  from  an  old 
man  born  and  bred  in  the  forest  who  remembered  having  once 
seen  it  done. 

Such  of  my  readers  as  know  Jacob  Grimm's  "Deutsche 
Kechts-Alterthumer  "  will  remember  that  a  similar  practice  i<^ 


656  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZmE. 

recorded  in  that  vast  monument  of  legal  archaeology*  I  often 
^  wonder  that  no  young  barrister  has  had  the  courage  to  trans- 
late this  work.  Probably  it  would  not  be  remunerative  in  the 
shape  of  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence,  but  it  could  not  fail  to 
give  him  a  high  position  in  his  profession ;  or  what  would  be 
unquestionably  more  popular,  use  the  book  as  Michelet  did  in 
his  "  Origines  du  Droit  Francais,"  make  Grimm's  work  the 
basis  of  a  clear  and  interesting  history  of  the  antiquities  of 
English  law. 

But  if  books  occasionally  disappear  like  certain  classes  of 
insects,  like  them  also  they  as  suddenly  reappear,  of  which  I 
have  myself  experienced  several  curious  proofs.  Talking  of 
books  and  insects,  I  should  like  to  know  why  it  is  that  so 
many  bookmen  and  antiquaries,  like  Douce  and  Albert  Way, 
have  been  entomologists.  That  inquiry -has  connected  with 
it  a  good  story  about  Francis  Douce  and  Cobbett  which  must 
wait  some  more  fitting  time  to  tell. 

Reverting  to  the  curious  reappearance  of  books,  and  to  the 
manner  in  which,  after  having  given  up  all  hopes  of  obtaining 
some  much-desired  volume,  no  sooner  is  one  copy  found  than 
a  second  one  turns  up,  I  had  a  curious  experience  with  respect 
to  one  of  my  Junius  volumes.  I  had  long  been  looking  out 
in  vain  for  a  copy  of  "  The  Vices,  a  Poem  in  Three  Cantos, 
from  the  original  MS.  in  the  presumed  handwriting  of  the 
author  of  'The  Letters  of  Junius,'  1828,"  and  which  a  well- 
known  Junius  collector  had  repeatedly  advertised  for  without 
success,  when  taking  up  one  of  Wilson's  catalogues,  alwa3rs 
worth  going  through,  I  saw  in  it,  to  my  great  delight,  "  The 
Vices."  But  my  delight  was  somewhat  diminished  when  I 
recollected  I  had  had  the  catalogue  some  days,  but  had  been 
too  busy  to  read  it.  I  started  off  at  once  to  Great  Russell 
Street  (it  was  before  he  removed  to  King  William  Street),  but, 
as  I  feared,  the  book  was  gone.  On  asking  Wilson  who  was 
the  lucky  purchaser,  he  named  a  nobleman,  then  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  who,  he  said,  he  was  sure  wonld  wiU 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM,  '  657 

lingly  lend  it  to  me  for  a  few  days  if  I  asked  him.  As  I  had 
not  the  advantages  of  being  known  to  the  fortunate  purchaser, 
it  was  not  till  I  had  received  reiterated  assurances  of  his 
'  invariable  kindness  in  such  matters  that  I  summoned  up  reso- 
-  lution  to  follow  this  advice.  My  application  was  most  prompt- 
ly and  courteously  granted.  I  at  otice  went  through  the  book, 
and  came  to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  not  by  Junius,  but  by  the 
notorious  William  Combe,  the  author  of  "  Doctor  Syntax,"  of 
that  precious  repository  of  Georgian  scandal  in  nine  volumes, 
the  "  Royal  Register,"  the  "  Diaboliad,"  etc.  The  book  con- 
tains a  facsimile  of  the  original  MS.,  with,  a  facsimile  of  one 
of  Junius's  Letters ;  but  as  of  the  many  Junius  claimants 
there  is  not  one  whose  claim  is  not  based  on  identity  of  hand- 
writing, I  place  no  faith  in  such  supposed  identity.  Of  course 
I  returned  the  book  almost  immediately,  and  had  no  sooner 
done  so  than  I  saw  in*  a  catalogue  from  some  bookseller  at 
Islington  another  copy  marked  at  rather  a  high  figure.  This 
I  secured,  and  it  is  now  before  me,  and  I  see  by  a  memoran- 
dum in  it  my  attention  was  first  called  to  "  The  Vices  "  by  Lord 
Brougham,  when  he  mentioned  to  me  the  "  Verses  addressed 
to  Betty  Giles"  which  form  so  important  a  feature  in  the 
magnificeht  volume  on  the  "  Handwriting  of  Junius  "  by  M. 
Chabot,  with  preface  and  collateral  evidence  by  the  Hon. 
Edward  Twisleton,  of  which  I  have  a  presentation  copy  from 
the  editor,  to  whom  I  had  lent  for  this  book  a  letter  from 
Lord  L5rttleton  dated  "  Maestricht,  November  27, 1771,"  which, 
by  showing,  as  it  does,  that  Lord  L)rttelton  had  been  and  was 
then  traveling  on  the  Continent,  completely  negatives  his 
claim  to  be  the  writer  of  the  Letters  of  Junius  which  were  at 
that  very  time  publishing  in  the  Public  Advertiser.  That  letter 
was  one  of  several  by  him  which  I  purchased  at  a  second-hand 
book  and  print  shop  in  the  Blackfriar's  Road. 

But  a  second  instance  in  my  own  experience  of  this  turn- 
ing up,  about  the  same  time,  of  a  duplicate  copy  of  a  book 
which  had  been  long  and  anxiously  looked  for,  is  the  mor** 


658  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

curious,  inasmuch  as  the  volunre  to  which  I  am  referring  is  of 
greater  raiity  and  literary  importance  than  "The  Vices/'  I 
refer  to  the  then  very  rare  and  most  interesting  collection  of 
NeapolLtan.fairy  tales,  "  II  Pentamerone  del  Cavalier  Giovan  - 
Battista  Basile.** 

My  interest  in  the  "  Pentamerone  "  was  first  excited  by  the 
references  made  to  it  in  Edgar  Taylor  and  Mrs.  Austin's 
admirable  selection  from  it  in  their  **  German  Pppular  Stones  " 
so  admirably  translated  by  them  from  the  collection  of  the 
Brothers  Grimm  and  so  wonderfully  illustrated  by  George 
Cruikshank,  and  of  which  my  copy — ^vae  mihi! — has  been 
thumbed  away  by  two  generations  of  juvenile  readers :  that 
book  stimulating  the  curiosity  as  to  the  history  of  fiction,  suhI  its 
cognate  subject  nursery  literature,  which  had  been  awakened  in 
me  by  the  admirable  articles  so  entitled  in  the  Quarterly  from 
the  pen  of  the  late  Sir  Francis  Palgrave ;  and  I  mastered  Ger- 
man enough  to  wade  through  the  three  little  Almain  quarto 
volumes  of  the  original  "  Kinder-und  Haus-Marchen,"  pub- 
lished at  Grottingen  in  1822.  There  I  learned  more  about  the 
*'  Pentamerone,"  and  tried  hard  to  secure  a  copy  of  it,  but 
waited  long  before  that  most  courteous  and  clever  of  caterers 
for  such  literary  wants  (of  whom  more  anon),  Tom  Rodd,  got 
me  that  which  I  now  possess,  which  is  of  the  edition  printed 
at  Naples  in  1674. 

But  during  the  ten  or  fifteen  years  which  elapsed  before  I 
got  this  copy  of  Basile,  the  idea  which  I  had  entertained  of 
mastering  the  Neapolitan  dialect  and  translating  Basile's 
stories  into  English  had  passed  away,  and  I  had  other  work 
in  hand ;  and  I  only  secured  the  book  in  case,  at  some  future 
time,  I  might  take  up  again  the  idea  of  preparing  an  English 
version  of  iU 

Within  a  month  of  getting  this  copy  I  was  offered  another 
— and,  strangely  enough,  at  a  shop  also  in  Newport  Street, 
and  within  fifty  yards  of  Tom  Rodd's.  I,  of  course,  secured 
that,  and  had  the  pleasure  of  giving  it  to  Crofton  Crpker,  the 


GOSSIP  OF  AN  OLD  BOOKWORM,  659 

author  of  the  "  Fairy  Legends  and  Traditions  of  the  South  of 
Ireland,"  who,  like  myself,  had  long  been  on  the  look-out  for 
one. 

What  a  number  of  old  friends  and  pleasant  associations  in 
connection  with  them  will  the  sight  of  an  old  book  some- 
times recall  to  our  minds !  I  have  already  mentioned  the  ac- 
complished authors  of  the  "  Lays  of  the  Minnesingers  "  and 
of  "  Maistre  Wace  his  Chronicle  of  the  Norman  Conquest," 
Edgar  Taylor  and  Crofton  Croker.  To  these  I  must  add  the 
name  of  Felix  Liebrecht,  the  learned  translator  and  annotator 
of  Dunlop's  "  History  of  Fiction,"  a  book  which  I  commend 
to  the  attention  of  any  publisher  or  editor  of  a  new  edition  of 
Dunlop.  I  owe  my  knowledge  of  this  accomplished  scfiolar 
to  Sir  George  Lewis,  who,  when  Liebrecht  visited  England 
some  five-and-twenty  years  since,  did  me  the  kindness  to 
give  him  a  letter  of  introduction  to  me.  Strangely  enough, 
I  did  not  then  know  that  he  had  translated  the  "Pen- 
tamerone "  into  German.  His  translation  in  two  volumes, 
with  a  preface  by  Jacob  Grimm,  was  published  at  Breslau  in 
1846.  English  antiquaries  are  indebted  to  him  also  for  a  work 
of  special  interest  to  them,  but  which,  I  have  reason  to  think, 
lis  not  known  so  generally  as  it  ought  to  be.  I  allude  to  "  Des 
Gervasius  von  Tilbury  Otia  Imperialia.  In  einer  Auswahl  neu 
herausgegeben  und  mit  Anmerkungen  begieitet,  8vo,  1856." 
It  is  dedicated  to  Sir  G.  Cornewall  Lewis,  and  the  fifty  or 
sixty  pages  of  the  original  text  of  Gervase  are  accompanied 
by  upwards  of  two  hundred  pages  of  most  valuable  notes. 
I  had  also  the  pleasure  of  numbering  among  my  friends  the 
late  John  Edward  Taylor,  the  English  translator  of  the  "  Pen- 
tamerone,"  published  in  1848  with  illustrations  by  George 
Cruikshank,  and  of  rendering  him  some  small  service  in  con- 
nection with  it.  He  had  heard  me  say  that  my  friend  and 
near  connection,  the  Rev,  James  Morton,  Vicar  of  Holbeach, 
the  learned  editor  of  the  *' Ancren  Riwle"  and  other  semi- 
Saxon  2ttjd  early  English  poems,  liad  a  Neapolitan  glossan'- 


66o  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

and  Taylor  asked  me  if  I  could  borrow  it  for  him.  I  wrote  at 
once  to  the  vicar,  and  the  answer  was  one  confirmatory'-  of 
what  I  have  already  insisted  upon.  Mr.  Morton  i>resented 
me  with  Galiani's  "  Del  Dialetto  Napolitano  "  and  the  accom- 
panying two  volumes  of  the  same  author's  "  Vocabolario 
Napolitano-Toscana,"  in  order  that  I  "  might  have  the  pleasure 
of  lending  them  "  to  John  Edward  Taylor. 

But  perhaps  the  most  curious  and  valuable  recovery  of  a 
book  long  sought  for  occurred  to  the  late  Mr.  Gren villa, 
whose  most  munificent  bequest  of  his  extraordinary  library 
to  the  British  Museum  entitles  him  to  the  gratitude  of  all 
scholars.  I  mention  the  fact  on  the  authority  of  my  late  hon- 
ored friend,  Mr.  Amyot,  the  secretary,  friend  and  biographer 
of  Wyndham,  and  for  so  many  years  treasurer  of  the  Society 
of  Antiquaries  and  director  of  the  Camden  Society,  Among 
the  choicest  books  in  his  library,  Mr.  Grenville  possessed  one 
of  two  volumes  of  an  excessively  rare  fifteener,  I  think,  the 
*'  Mazarine  Bible,"  printed  on  vellum  and  magnificently  bound. 
Of  course  he  was  very  anxious  to  get  a  copy  of  the  missing 
volume  also  on  vellum,  but  he  hoped  almost  against  hope. 
After  many  years,  however,  he  had  the  unexpected  and  almost 
unexampled  good  fortune  to  get  not  only  a  copy  on  velhim, 
but  the  identical  copy,  as  shown  by  the  binding,  which  had 
been  so  long  separated  from  the  one  in  his  possession.  Mr. 
Grenville,  when  showing  the  books  to  Mr.  Amyot  and  to 
Samuel  Rogers,  who  was  there  at  the  same  time,  told  the  his- 
tory of  his  good  fortune. 

Amyot  said  it  was  the  most  remarkable  coincidence  he  had 
ever  heard. 

Rogers  did  not  quite  agree  to  this,  and  proceeded  to  mention 
the  following,  which  he  thought  still  more  remarkable  : 

An  officer  who  was  ordered  to  India  went,  on  the  day  before 
leaving  England,  to  his  lawyer's  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields.    The 
day  being  wet,  he  took  a  hackney  coach,  and  when  he  got 
"S  he  was  paying  the  driver,  dropped  a  shilling.    He  looked 


out. 
»ked        I 


~    tUNEIFORM  WRITING.  66 

in  the  mud  and  slush  for  it  in  vain,  and  so  did  the  coachman. 
On  his  return  home  after  some  years'  service  he  had  again 
occasion  to  go  to  his  lawyer's  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields.  When 
leaving,  he  recollected  his  lost  shilling,  and  by  some  unac- 
countable impulse  began  to  look  for  it,  when,  strange  to  say, 
just  at  the  very  spot  where  he  had  paid  the  coachman,  and 
on  the  very  edge  of  the  curbstone,  he  found — 

"  The  shilling ! "  was  the  hasty  conclusion  of  my  excellent 
friend. 

"  Not  exactly,"  said  Rogers,  "  but  twelve-pennyworth  of 
coppers  wrapped  up  in  brown  paper !  " 

Siimuel  Rogers  is  said  to  have  been  great  at  what  Arbuthnot 
called  '*  The  Art  of  Selling  Bargains,"  of  which  curious  tract, 
with  its  unquotable  and  Swiftian  leading  title  (for  which  the 
curious  reader  is  referred  to  Arbuthnot's  works,  vol.  ii.  p.  156), 
.  I  once  picked  up  an  original  copy  which  I  presented  to  a 
worthy  member  of  the  Stock  Exchange  fully  capable  of  en- 
joying the  humor  of  it.  But  probably^ the  reader  may  now  be 
of  the  bpinion  that  "  now  'tis  time  that  we  shake  hands  and 
part,"  at  least  for  the  present.    So  be  it ! 

W.  J.  Thoms,  in  The  Nineteenth  Century. 


CUNEIFORM  WRITING. 

Cuneiform  Writing  was  in  use  in  Asia  previous  to  the  time 
of  Alexander  the  Great,  in  those  countries  which  the  Euphra- 
tes and  the  Tigris  drain,  and  also  in  the  western  and  the  south- 
western part  of  what  is  now  called  Persia.  So  remote  is  the 
civilization  that  flourished  in  these  valleys  that  Xenophon 
describe!^  the  ruins  where  the  ten  thousand  encamped  as 
being  those  of  an  ancient  city. 

The  name  cuneiform  (Latin  cuneus,  wedge)  has  been  given 
to  the  writing  on  account  of  the  shape  of  its  characters,  which 

♦  Read  before  the  Cincinnati  Literary  Club. 


;  662  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE. 

is  that  of  a  double  wedge.  •  The  French  employed  the  same 
term,  but  the  Germans  have  formed  a  compound  of  their 
own,  Keilschrift,  which  has  the  same  meaning.  Other  terms 
proposed  from  time  to  time,  but  without  finding  much  fa- 
vor, are  arrow-headed,  nail-headed  (French  tete-a-clou),  and 
Sphenogram  (from  Greek  (Jcp?;^,  wedge).  This  writing  (the 
different  kinds  of  which  we  shall  mention  hereafter)  is  found 
upon  high  rocks  which  have  been  smoothed,  frequently  ac- ' 
companied  by  figures. 

For  example,  the  Persian  inscriptions  at  Behistun  have 
protraitures  of  Darius,  four  attendants  and  nine^  captives 
bound.  A  tenth  captive  is  represented  as  lying  upon  his  back 
with  his  hands  raised  suppliantly.  This  writing,  with  and 
without  drawings,  is  also  found  on  bricks,  cylinders,  and  tablets 
of  clay,  on  stones  and  alabaster;  in  a  word,  ever)''thing  seems 
to  have  been  called  into  service,  that  these  marks,  for  ages 
afterwards  inexplicable,  might  be  cut  or  impressed  thereupon. 
Excavations  at  Nineveh,  Babylon  and  elsewhere  have  brought 
to  light  many  such  specimens.  As  with  us  printing  andwrit- 
,  ing  vary  in  size  according  to  the  end  desired,  so  there  is 
cuneiform  writing,  of  which  the  wedges' are  several  inches  in 
length,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  sometimes  so  fine  that 
the  naked  eye  cannot  discern  the  separate  characters.  The 
writer  examined  this  second  kind  as  found  upon  a  cylinder 
brought  from  Babylon.  This  cylinder  was  made  of  black 
clay,  and  was  one  inch  long  and  three-fourths  of  an  inch  in 
diameter.  There  was  a  hole  through  it  lengthwise.  Perhaps 
it  had  been  suspended  from  the  neck  as  a  charm ;  and  tliio 
seems  to  be  indicated  by  the  translation  of  the  inscription  which 
was,  according  to  George  Smith,  as  follows :  "  The^eal  (or 
amulet)  of  a  man  named  Kizirtu,  son  of  the  woman  Satumaui, 
belonging  to  the  family  of  Ishtar  and  Nana."  The  characters 
on  soft  substances  were  made  by  pressing  one  corner  of  the 
stilus  upon  the  material  and  drawing  it  along  gradually 
towards  the  surface.     In  all  probability  cuneiform  writing  fell 


CUNEIFORM  WRITING.        '  663 

into  disuse  before  the  Achaemenian  kings  ceased  to  reign,  and 
it  was  not  long  after  the  end  of  this  dynasty  that  it  was  a 
sealed  letter  to  the  world.  At  least  one  classical  reference  to 
it  is  found,  namely,  in  Herodotus,  4th  bk.  87  chap.  It  reads  thus : 
"  It  is  said  that  Darius  surveyed  the  Bosphorus  and  erected 
upon  its  shores  two  pillars  of  white  marble,  whereupon  he 
inscribed  the  names  of  all  the  nations  which  formed  his  army, 
on  the  one  pillar  in  Greek  and  on  the  other  in  Assyrian."  In 
the  same  chapter  it  also  reads :  "  The  Byzantines  removed 
these  pillars  to  their  own  city,  one  block  remained  behind  ;  it 
lay  near  the  temple  of  Bacchus  at  Byzantium,  and  was  covered 
;with  Assyrian  writing."  Herodotus  meant  Persian  writing, 
internally  very  different  from  Assyrian ;  both,  however,  are 
cuneiform.  Pliny,  in  Natural  History,  bk.  7,  chap.  57,  says : 
"I  always  thought  that  letters  were  of  Assyrian  origin." 
This  only  means  that  they  came  from  some  place  in  Asia  at  a 
distance  from  the  coast ;  for  the  name  Assyria  was  used  in- 
definitely, just  as  the  name  Ethiopia,  in  later  times,  was  given 
to  all  the  interior  of  Africa  of  which  we  had  no  knowledge, 

The  existence  of  the  inscriptions  and  figures  at  Behistun 
must  have  been  known  to  many.  The  rock  on  which  they 
are  engraved  is  on  the  highway  from  Babylonia  to  the  East. 
This  rock,  almost  perpendicular,  rises  to  a  height  of  1,700 
feet.  At  a  height  of  600  feet  are  these  chronicles  of  the  ex- 
ploits of  Darius.  It  is  due  to  this  that  they  are  remaining  to 
the  present  day,  for  if  they  had  been  easily  accessible,  the 
iconoclastic  spirit  of  Mohammedanism  would  have  quickly 
destroyed  them. 

In  1618  an  embassador  of  Philip  III.  of  Spain  copied,  while 
at  Persepolis,  a  line  of  cuneiform  writing  from  one  of  its  ruins, 
convinced  that  it  was  a  lost  language.  From  that  time  vari- 
ous accounts  and  also  transcriptions  were  brought  to  Europe. 
Scholars  who  thought  it  worth  their  while  to  pay  any  atten-  * 
tion  to  these  peculiar  marks  began  to  guess,  as  one  who 
would  spend  a  few  leisure  moments  in  giving  hap-hazard  an- 


664  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

swers  to  a  riddle,  never  dreaming  that  this  was  a  language. 
One  thought  they  were  talismans,  and  another  astronomical 
signs  ;  a  third  was  of  the  opinion  that  the  architect  had  tried 
to  see  how  many  different  kind  of  strokes  he  could  make,  and 
a  (our^h  ascribed  them  to  the  action  of  worms  upon  the  stones- 
All  this  failed  to  satisfy  any  one,  and  the  conclusion  was  in- 
evitable that  here  was  a  language  that  was  jealously  guarding 
its  secrets  from  man. 

Scholars  now  began  to  treat  it  with  some  degree  of  serious- 
ness, though  by  no  means  commensurate  with  the  task  set 
-before  {hem.  A  few  resemblances,  real  or  fancied,  were 
caught  at  by  the  too  eager  student,  generalizations  quickly 
followed  and  the  results  thereof  heralded  abroad.  Fortunately" 
scarcely  two  agreed,  so  that  error  was  not  strengthened  by 
unanimity.  Some  of  the  widely  divergent  views  called  this 
language  Grecian,  Runic,  Samaritan,  Hebrew,  Arabic.  One 
went  so  far  that  he  translated  the  inscriptions  as  passages 
from  tne  Koran,  and  another  read  them  as  an  account  of  the 
exploits  of  Tamerlane.  We  may  smile  at  such  a  diversity  of 
opinion  among  scholars,  and  put  them  down  as  mere  pre- 
tenders to  the  name,  but  we  had  better  first  pause  lest  we  con- 
demn our  own  day  and  generation ;  for  even  now  the  Etruscan 
language  remains  undeciphered,  and  like  a  lost  child  whose  in- 
distinct utterances  each  questioner  interprets  differently,  and 
thinks  that  he  has  discovered  therefrom  where  its  home  is, 
so  philologists  have  in  turn  made  the  Etruscan  akin  to  the 
Latin,  the  Grecian,  the  Irish,  the  Teutonic,  and  the  Hebrew 
languages,  and  have  even  enrolled  it  as  belonging  to  the  Tura- 
nian family. 

In  the  last  century  Karstenniebuhr,  the  father  of  the  his- 
torian, did  the  first  effective  work  towards  reaching  certain 
results,  by  making  accurate  copies  of  the  inscriptions  at  Per- 
sepolis.  He  also  ventured  the  assertion,  afterwards  proved  to 
be  correct,  that  there  was  not  one,  but  three  kinds  of  cunei- 
form writing,  and,  consequently,  the  inscriptions  were  trilin- 


CUNEIFORM  WRITING,  665 

g^al.  Although  he  did  not  decipher  a  letter,  yet  of  the  first 
kind,  the  simplest,  he  distinguished  42  different  signs.  This 
first  kind  has  received  the  name  of  "  Persian  Cuneiform 
Writing,"  and  the  following  remarks,  until  the  contrary  is 
stated,  will  be  applicable  to  it  only.  The  next  step  taken  was  by 
Tychsen,  who  discovered  that  a  diagonal  wedge  served  to 
divide  words.  Munter,  a  Dane,  followed,  who  proved  that  the 
language  was  to  be  read  from  left  to  right.  It  was  in  1802^ 
that  Grotefend  of  Hannover,  laid  before  the  academy  of  that 
place  his  truly  great  discovery,  which  was  the  Rosetta  stoiie 
of  cuneiform  wfiting.  Grotefend,  as  he  himself  said,  had 
no  profound  acquaintance  with  Oriental  languages.  He  had 
devoted  himself,  heretofore,  mostly  to  Latin  and  the  early 
languages  of  Italy.  What  he  accomplished  in  this  other  de- 
partment was  by  means  of  a  series  of  shrewd  conjectures 
controlled  by  good  judgment.  His  mode  of  procedure  we 
shall  briefly  describe.  Grotefend  took  two  of  the  trilingual 
inscriptions  as  published  by  Niebulhr  in  his  book  of  travels. 
He  assumed  that  the  conjectures  of  Niebuhr,  Tychsen,  and 
Munter  were  correct,  and,  furthermore,  that  inscriptions  with 
figures  of  kings  must  tell  of  the  deeds  of  kings,  and  that  their 
titles  must  be  found  therein.  Tychsen  had  already  stated  this 
as  a  probability.  Grotefend  was  now  wholly  left  to  himself. 
After  closely  scrutinizing  the  two  inscriptions  he  met  with  a 
certain  combination  of  very  frequent  occurrence.  It  occu- 
pied the  second  place  at  the  commencement  of  each  inscrip- 
tion, and  also  of  paragraphs,  which  were  indicated  by  a  vacant 
space  intervening.  He  inferred  that  this  combination  meant 
king,  and  that  the  word  preceding  must  be  the  name  of  the 
king.  In  the  two  invScriptions  the  combination  preceding 
king  was  different,  consequently  the  two  inscriptions  referred 
to  different  monarchs.  Again  this  combination  for  king  was 
in  several  places  followed  by  itself,  and  again  repeated  with  a 
change  in  the  ending.  What  else  could  this  be  than  the  plural 
of  king»  thus  giving  a  title  common  to  eastern  monarchs^ 


666      ^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

"  king  of  kings  "  ?  The  name  of  the  king  on  the  first  inscrip- 
tion we  shall  designate  as  A,  on  the  second  as  B,  accordingly 
the  first  one  read :  "  A  king,  king  of  kings,"  the  second,  "  B 
king,  king  of  kings."  But  after  *' A  king,  king  of  kings,"  fol- 
lowed the  same  words  as  those  with  which  the  second  begfan 
except  that  one  combination  of  wedges  intervened,  which  we 
shall  call  X.  It  then  read  "  A.  king,  king  of  kings,  X.  R  kii]^, 
king  of  kings."  Now  X.  must  indicate  the  relationship  be- 
tween A.  and  B.,  which  would  most  probably  be  son.  It  was 
taken  for  granted  then,  that  X.  meant  son.  The  first  inscrip- 
tion read:  "A.  king,  king  of  kings,  son  o^  B.  king,  king-  of 
kings,"  and  this  was  again  followed  by  the  sign  for  son;  of 
course  the  following  word  must  be  the  name  of  the  father 
whom  we  shall  call  C.  C,  however,  was  not  followed  by  the 
title  "  king  of  kings  "  or  even  "  king."  Likewise  the  second 
inscription  read :  "  B.  king,  king  of  kings,  son  of  C.,"not  fol- 
lowed by  a  title ;  therefore  C.  did  not  occupy  the  throne.  It 
was  known  that  the  buildings  in  Persepolis  had  been  erected 
during  the  Achaemenides.  Grotefend  then  went  over  the  list 
of  these  kings  as  given  by  Greek  historians,  and  applied  the 
different  pairs,  where  son  succeeded  father,  to  the  characters 
of  the  inscription.  The  only  pair  that  answered  all  the  con- 
ditions was  that  of  Xerxes,  son  of  Darius,  son  of  Hystaspes, 
a  Persian  noble  but  not  a  king.  The  opening  of  the  first  in- 
scription was :  "  Xerxes,  king,  king  of  kings,  son  of  Darius. 
king,  king  of  kings,  son  of  Hystaspes."  Of  the  second, 
"  Darius,  king,  king  of  kings,  son  of  Hystaspes." 

Grotefend  next  set  himself  to  work  to  ascertain  the  Persian 
pronunciation  of  these  three  proper  names.  He  succeeded 
chiefly  by  aid  of  the  Zend,  and  thus  established  the  phonetic 
value  of  nearly  one-third  of  the  forty-two  letters  of  .the  Persiaa 
alphabet. 

The  principal  kinds  of  cuneiform  writing,  with  the  families 
to  which  they  belong,  are  as  follows :  Persian  (Aryan) ;  Medfim 
(Turanian)  ;  Assyrio-Babylonian  (Shemetic).    These  arc  file 


CUNEIFORM  WRITING.  (^7 

languages  of  the  tii-'lingual  inscriptioiis.  Under  the  Achaeme- 
nian  rulers,  it  was  necessary  for  the  sovereign  to  issue  his 
decrees  in  all  these  languages,  as  now  the  Turkish  Pasha 
makes  use  of  Persian  (Aryan)  ;  Turkish  (Turanian),  and  Arabic 
(Shemitic).  Grammatically  ancient  Persian  resembles  San- 
skrit most,  and  is  connected  with  modern  Persian.  Its  char- 
acteristics are  (i)  the  alpliabetof  forty-two  letters ;  (2)  the  ob- 
lique wedge  to  separate  words.  Rawlinsoa,  an  Englishman,  has 
been  the  most  successful  investigator  in  this  kind  of  cunei-* 
form  writing,  for  Grotefend  achieved  almost  nothing  after  his 
first  happy  conjectures. 

The  Median  (Turaniaa)  is  never  found,  with  but  one  excep- 
tion, save  as  a  transcript  of  Persian.  In  inscriptions,  it  always 
has  the  second  position,  unless  this  happens  to  be  the  place 
of  honor.  Hence,  those  to  whom  this  language  belonged  were 
inferior  to  the  Persians  and  superior  to  the  Shemites,  whose 
language  occupied  the  third  position.  This  pointed  to  the 
Medes,  who,  although  they  were  conquered,  yet  enjoyed 
certain  political  rights  under  the  Persians,  not  granted  to  the 
Shemites. 

In  the  Median,  tlie  characters  represent  not  letters  but 
syllables^  consisting  of  a  single  vowel,  of  a  consonant  and  a 
vowel,  or  of  two  consonants  with  a  vowel  intervening.  Of 
these  there  are  in  groups,  100  of  which  are  known  to  a  cer- 
tainty, the  others  are  prpblematical.  Assyrio-Bablyonian 
(Shemitic)  is  the  oldest  of  these.  It,  as  well  as  all  cuneiform 
writing,  is  read  from  left  to  right,  contrary  to  that  which  one 
would  expect  in  a  Shemitic  language ;  although  it  is  not  the 
only  exception  to  the  rule,  that  Shemitic  languages  are  read 
from  right  to  left. 

Over  600  characters  have  been  classified,  varying  from  one 
to  twenty  wedges.  The  language  is  syllabic  like  the  Median 
and  also  ideographic.  By  ideographic  we  do  not  mean  like 
the  hieroglyphics  of  Egypt.  These  are  indeed  ideographic, 
but  symbolic  or  enigmatic.    To  illustrate:  the  figure  of  a 


668  THE  LIBRA R  V  MAGAZINE. 

jackal  means  cunning,  of  a  lamp  life.  The  ideographs  of  As- 
syrio-Babylonian  are  literal,  the  outline  of  a  hand  means 
handy  of  the  sun,  sun.  The  sign  of  to  drink  is  made  up  of  the 
sign  for  mouth  zxi^  that  ior  water.  The  resemblances  of  these 
mentioned  can  be  traced,  though  that  is  not  the  case  with 
very  many.  However,  that  which  is  the  peculiar*  feature  of 
their  kind  of  cuneiform  writing  is  pol)rphony.  Hincks , 
defines  it  thus :  "  Polyphony  implies  that  a  character  may 
represent  more  than  one  sound,  when  employed  as  a  phonetic 
ingredient  in  a  word ;  but  it  implies  also  that  those  sounds 
have  no  phonetic  resemblance  to  one  another."  This  we 
supplement  by  adding  that  the  same  character  may  be  used 
as  ideographs  for  different  ideas.  In  the  majority  of  in- ' 
stances,  it  is  only  the  connection  that  can  decide  whether  a 
certain  combination  of  three  wedges  represents  the  syllable 
mat,  kur,  sat,  ot  sad,  or  means  land,  mountain,  property,  to  con- 
quer,  to  take  possession  of,  A  different  combination  of  three 
has  the  phonetic  values  of  ud,  ut,  tarn,  tav,  par,  lak,  and  the 
ideographic  values  of  day,  sun,  sun-^ise,  to  rise  (of  the  sun> 
and  lo  see. 

Polyphony  was  first  discovered  by  Rawlinson,  but  it  seemed 
so  improbable  that  the  learned  world  looked  askance  at  all 
translations  of  Assyrian  or  Babylonian  writing.  In  1857,  the 
Royal  Asiatic  Society  submitted  a  transcript  of  a  long  inscrip- 
tion of  Tiglath  Pileser  to  four  Assyrian  scholars,  Rawlioson, 
Talbot,  Hincks,  and  Oppert.  These  prepared  independent 
translations  and  sent  them  to  the  society  sealed.  They  were 
compared  and  found  to  be  identical,  with  the  exception  of  the 
proper  names.  If  time  permitted  we  could  easily  prove  to  aa 
unbiased  mind  the  existence  of  polyphony  even  to  the  extent 
mentioned  above.  Any  one  acquainted  with  phonography 
knows  that  a  combination  of  signs  may  stand  for  half  a  doizen  j 
or  more  different  words,  and  it  is  the  connection  that  decides  I 
for  which  one  of  these  it  does  stand.  J 

The  Assyrio-Babylonian  literature  seems  to  be  exhattit-l 


CUNEIFORM  WRITING,  669 

less.  The  libraries  found  in  the  ruins  of  the  old  palaces,  and 
especially  in  that  of  Assurbanipal,  contain  most  valuable  doc- 
uments pertaining  to  chronology,  history,  mythology,  and 
religion ;  legal  and  astronomical  treatises,  accounts  of  com- 
mercial transactions,  copies  of  poems,  royal  proclamations ; 
also  disquisitions  pertaining  to  grammar  and  lexicography.  Of 
the  last  the  syllabaries  have  been  especially  valuable  in  ex- 
plaining the  syllabic  and  ideographic  values  of  signs.  These 
are  about  half  an  inch  thick  and  two  or  more  inches  in  length, 
having  from  two  to  four  parallel  columns.  In  some  cases 
both  sides  are  T^rritten  upon.  A  few  historical  remarks  will 
explain  the  use  of  these  : — 

In  Gen.  x.  10,  it  is  said  of  Nimrod  (the  son  of  Cush,  the  son 
of  Ham), "  The  beginning  of  his  kingdom  was  Babel  and  Erech, 
and  Accad,  and^alneh,  in  the  land  of  Shinar."  In  Gen.  xi.  2, 
it  is  said  of  the  descendants  of  Shem,  "  As  they  journeyed 
eastward  (as  in  the  margin)  that  they  found  a  plain  in  the  land 
of  Shinar,  and  they  dwelt  there."  The  monarchs  of  this  land, 
subdued  by  the  Shemites,  called  themselves  "  Kings  of  Sumir 
and  Accaid,"  or  "  Kings  Of  Accad."  And  this  term  Accad,  or 
Accadian,  is  now  used  to  designate  the  language  and  popula- 
tion of  primitive  Chaldaea.  These  Shemites  adopted  not  only 
the  arts,  sciences,  and  literature  of  this  conquered  people,  but 
also  the  characters  in  which  they  wrote,  i.  e.,  the  cuneiform 
characters  of  an  agglutinative  language.  The  Accadian  lan- 
guage soon  afterwards  became  extinct.  Assurbanipal  (Sar- 
danapalus)  the  "  Grand  Monarch  of  Assyria,"  was  a  friend  of 
letters,  and  gathered  into  his  library  at  Nineveh  all  the  literary 
treasures  of  Babylonia  and  Assyria.  The  study  of  Accadian 
was,  as  a  classical  language,  under  him  revived,  and,  in  order 
to  facilitate  this  by  explaining  the  meaning  and  composition 
of  unusual  or  antiquated  combinations  these  syllabaries  were 
made.  This  library  of  Sardanapalus  at  Nineveh,  called  the 
Mound  of  Kou)runjik,  was  discovered  by  Layard  in  1850,  who 
sent  several  boxes  of  fragments  to  England.    Much  has  been 


670  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.      . 

accomplished  in  cuneiform  investigation,  but  enough  is  left 
to  give  occupation  to  scholars  for  decades. 

W.  O.  Sproull,  Ph.  D., 


ENGLISH  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH. 

Few  of  the  subjects  with  which  modem  science  has  had, 
and  still  has,  to  deal,  are  more  interesting  than  the  inquiry 
into  the  changes  which  a  language  gradually  and,  as  It  were, 
unconsciously  undergoes,  even  among  a  people  occupying 
one  and  the  same  region,  and  apparently  exposed, to  few  and 
slight  changes  from  without.  No  one  who  consider;s  the  var- 
iety of  dialect  within  our  own  country  ^at  the  present  time,  or 
the  evidence  of  continual  change  in  the  English  tongue,  from 
the  time  when  it  was  first  known  as  a  written  language,  can 
fail  to  perceive  that,  apart  from  external  influences  (though,  of 
course,  such  influences  have  not  been  wanting  in  England),  a 
language  is  in  a  state  of  continual  flux — ^in  pronunciation,  in 
the  use  and  meaning  of  words,  i^  manner  of  expression, 
idiom,  and  in  various  other  respects. 

The  characteristics  which  distinguish  the  dialects  of  the 
northern  from  those  of  the  midland  and  southern  counties  of 
England,  or  even  the  dialects  of  adjacent  counties  (as  Lan- 
cashire and  Yorkshire,  Somersetshire  and  Devonshire,  or 
Dorsetshire  and  Hampshire)  from  each  other,^were  manifestly 
not  the  growth  of  a  few  years,  but  of  centuries.  The  progress 
of  our  language  from  the  earliest  Anglo-Saxon  days  to  our 
own  time  is,  of  course,  accorded  in  the  literature  of  the  nation, 
which,  carefully  studied^  reveals  not  only  the  more  obvious 
influences  oi  such  causes  as  the  Norman  coaquest  and  the 
sequent  intercourse  with  France,  but  also  the  subtler  chaises 
which  belong  to  the  inherent  growth  of  our  language. 

It  is  easy  to  perceive  also  how  the  spread  of  education  luis 
had  its  influence — and  a  very  powerful  influence — ^in  check* 
ing  changes  which  otherwise  would  have  been  ni|Hd.    Ifc 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH.  67I 

find,  for  instance,  that  in  earlier  times,  books  written  in  the 
English  of  the  day,  being  read  by  few,  had  small  influence  in 
stereotyping,  as  it  were,  the  use  of  words  or  phrases.  But 
the  writings  of  later  times,  and  especially  those  of  the  six- 
teenth and  seventeenth  centuries  (above  all,  the  translation 
of  the  Bible  in  the  reign  of  James  I.),  have  had  a  most 
marked  effect  in  preventing  rapid  changes  in  the  language. 
The  reason  is  obvious.  Few  read  the  earlier  works,  many 
read  the  later,  and  still  more  hear  them  read  or  quoted,  and 
more  still  come  into  contact  with  those  who  have  read  them. 
Sp  that  the  words  and  modes  of  expression  in  the  later  works 
remain  current  from  generation  to  generation,  while  many 
of  those  in  the  earlier  works  have  become  obsolete. 

Yet  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  even  this  influence,  potent 
though  it  unquestionably  has  been,  ha6  not  prevented  change 
altogether.  In  fact,  it  is  clear  that  with  the  lapse  of  time  its 
power  must  diminish.  In  the  eighteenth  century,  for  instance, 
— ^but  still  more  in  the  latter  half  of  the  seventeenth  century 
— modes  of  expression  used  in  James's  Bible  and  in  the  Book 
of  Common  Prayer  (which,  though  older,  may  be  regarded  as 
belonging  to  the  same  era  in  our  language)  were  still  employ- 
ed in  ordinary  life ;  and  the  fact  that  they  were  so  often  heard 
in  church,  chapel,  and  conventicle,  helped  to  retain  them  in 
such  usage.  But  when  once  an  expression  had  fallen  out  of 
use — which  would  happen  even  in  the  case  of  some  expres- 
sions once  familiarly  employed — Bible  reading  and  the  weekly 
use  of  prayers,  collects,  epistles,  gospels,  psalms,  and  so  forth, 
could,  not  restore  it  to  general  circulation.  The  number  of 
words,  modes  of  expression,  idioms,  etc.,  which  have  thus 
passed  out  of  use  necessarily  increases  with  the  lapse  of  time, 
and  in  time,  of  course,  the  book  which  had  for  a  longer  or 
shorter  time  prevented  so  many  expressions  from  becoming 
obsolete,  would  become  obsolete  itself.  A  new  translation 
would,  in  other  words,  become  necessary — not.  as  in  the  case 
of   the    present    revised    translation,   because  of  increased 


6/2  THE  LIBRA R  V  MAGAZINE. 

knowledge  of  the  original  and  increased  facilities  for  inter- 
preting it,  but  because  the  language  of  the  Bible  would  have 
ceased  to  be  the  language  of  the  people.* 

It  may  be  interesting  to  consider  the  various  ways  in  which 
words,  phrases,  and  expressions  have  fallen  out  of  use  since 
the  time  when  the  present  English  version  of  the  Bible  was 
prepared. 

Some  modes  of  expression  seem  to  have  died  out  without 
any  very  obvious  cause.  For  instance,  in  the  time  of  James 
I.  the  words  "all  to"  were  used  where  we  now  say  "alto- 
gether." So  completely  has  the  former  usage  passed  away, 
that  most  persons  understand  the  words  "and  all  to  brake  his 
skull "  (when  read  aloud)  as  if  they  meant  "  and  all  to  break 
his  skull ; "  in  reality,  of  course,  the  words  mean  "and  utterly 
crushed  his  scull."  Other  words  and  phrases  have  lost  their 
original  meaning  in  consequence  of  the  growth  (usually  in 
literature)  of  another  significance.  For  instance,  as  the  word 
"  comprehend  "  gradually  approximated  in  meaning  to  the 
word  "  understand,"  with  which  it  is  now  almost  synonymous, 
its  old  usage,  shown  in  the  Bible  expression  "  the  darkness 
comprehended  it  not "  (that  is,  the  darkness  did  not  inclose 
and  overmaster  or  absorbt  the  light),  was  gradually  lost ;  at 
the  present  day,  no  one  would  think  of  using  the  word  in  its 
older  and,  in  reality,  more  correct  sense.  In  other  cases, 
words  have  acquired  a  meaning  almost  opposite  to  that  which 
they  had  when  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  and  the  present 
English  version  of  the  Bible  were  prepared.  Thus,  we  now 
use  the  word  "prevent"  as  almost  synonymous  with  "hin- 
der"; but  it  is  used  in  the  opposite  sense  in  the  familiar  prayer 

*  It  appears  to  me  a  circumstance  to  be  regretted  that  those  who. have  been  at  so 
much  pains  to  revise  the  Bible,  should  not  have  been  bold  enough  to  present  their 
revised  version  in  the  English  of  our  own  time,  instead  of  the  old-fashioned  EInglish 
of  the  time  of  Elizabeth  and  James.  This,  perhaps,  is  the  first  occasion  in  the  histoy 
of  Bible  translation  when  men  have  expressed  Bible  teachings  in  a  Uuigiuig«  such  at 
they  do  not  themselves  speak. 

t  Con  intensative,  and  prekendo  to  grasp  or  seize. 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  673 

beginning  "Prevent  us,  O  Lord,  in  all  our  doings."  So  the 
"word  "let,"  which  formerly  corresponded  very  nearly  with 
•*  hinder  "  or  "  prevent "  (as  at  present  used),  now  implies  the 
reverse ;  so  that  there  was  nothing  strange  originally  in  the 
prayer  that  we  might  not  be  "  let  or  hindered,"  though  now 
the  expression  is  certainly  conjtradictory  and  perplexing  (es- 
pecially to  the  younger  church-goers).  Some  words  and 
phrases,  without  having  taken  a  new  meaning,  or  even  lost 
their  old  meaning,  have  fallen  out  of  use  in  ordinary  speech 
or  in  prose  writing,  but  are  still  freelyused  in  poetry.  Other 
phrases  or  usages  have  come  to  be  regarded  as  ungrammatical 
— such,  for  instance,  as  the  use  o£  the  word  "often "  for  "fre- 
quent." ("  Take  a  little  wine  for  thy  stomach's  sake  and  thine 
often  infirmities.")* 

As  regards  pronunciation,  it  would  be  difficult  to  follow 
and  interpret  all  the  changes  which  have  taken  place.  Of 
some  changes,  indeed,  we  have  no  recorded  evidence,  while 
of  others  the  evidence  is  but  vague  and  doubtful.  If  the 
spelling,  instead  of  being  left  f\^ee  to  individual  fancy  in  for- 
mer times,  had  been  fixed  as  now,  it  would  yet  be  (as  it  cer- 
tainly is  at  present)  no  guide  whatever  to  pronunciation. 
And,  in  passing,  it  may  be  noticed  that  the  advocates  of  a 
phonetic  system  of  spelling  might  find  a  strong  argument  in 
the  circumstance  that  such  a  system  would  enable  the  philol- 
ogist of  the  future  to  trace  the  various  changes  which  pronun- 
ciation will  hereafter  undergo ;  while  had  such  a  system  been 
adopted  in  the  past,  we  could  form  now  a  fair  idea  of  the  way 
in  which  our  xincestors  during  different  centuries  of  our  past 
history  spoke  the  English  language  of  their  day. 

There  are,  however,  some  indications  which  afford  tolera- 
bly sure  evidence  as  to  particular  changes  which  the  pronun- 
ciation of  certain  words  has  undergone. 

*  Compare  Jaques*s  words.  '*  It  is  a  melancholy  of  my  own,  compounded  of  many 
simples,  extracted  from  many  objects,  and,  indeed,  the  sundry  contemplation  of  my 
travebt,  in  which  my  often  rumination  wraps  me  in  a  most  humorous  sadness."     \r 
passing,  note  here  the  obsolete  use  of  the  words  sundry  and  humorous. 
L.   M.—22 


674  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

For  instance,  remembering  that  many  of  our  w6rds  have 
been  derived  directly  from  the  French,  but  have  been  spelled 
almost  from  their  introduction,  in  an  English  manner,  we  can 
infer  what  was  the  ordinary  sound-value  of  particular  letters, 
singly  or  together.  Thus,  since  the  French  words  "  raison  " 
and  "  saison  "  are  represented  in  English  by  the  words  "  rea- 
son "  and  "  season,"  we  may  infer  that  the  diphthong  "  ea  " 
originally  represented  the  sound  which  it  still  represents  in 
the  word  "great."  For  we  can  be  tolerably  sure  that  the 
change  has  been  in  the  English,  not  in  the  French,  pronun- 
ciation of  these  words.  There  is  no  reason  for  supposing  that 
in  French  the  letters  "ai  "  represent  the  sound  "e,"  as  do  the 
letters  "ea  "in  "reason"  or  "season."  -In  fact,  "  ai "  never 
could  represent  the  sound  "  e."  We  infer  then,  that  the  change 
has  been  in  the  English,  and  that  two  or  three  centuries  ago 
the  words  "  reason  **  and  "  season  "  were  pronounced  "  rayson  " 
and  "  sayson,"  as  they  still  are  in  Ireland  (not,  as  is  commonly 
supposed,  because  in  Ireland  the  pronunciation  has  been  cor- 
rupted, but  because  there  the  old-fashioned  pronunciation 
has  been  retained).  We  find  thus  an  explanation  of  certain 
words  and  passages  in  old  writings  that  otherwise  seem  per- 
plexing.   For  instance,  Falstafif  says  in  reply  to  the  request  of 

Hal  and  Poins  for  "a  reason,"  "What,  upon  compulsion 

Give  you  a  reason  on  compulsion  ?  if  reasons  were  as  plenty 
as  blackberries  I  would  give  no  man  a  reason  on  compulsion ! " 
a  meaningless  rejoinder,  at  least  compared  with  the  same  an- 
swer when  the  word  "  reason  "  is  pronounced  like  the  word 
"  raisin."*    So  the  "  nipping  and   eager  air,"  spoken  of  in 

*  There  are  reasons  for  thinking  that  in  many  cases  the  letters  "  ee,*'  as  well  as 
**  ea,"  had  the  sound  "  ai  '*  in  Shakespeare's  time.    Thus  the  two  lines- 
She  was  a  wight  if  ever  such  wight  were 
To -suckle  fools  and  chronicle  small  beer — 
probably  forming  a  rhyming  couplet.    So  also,  probably  the  lines 

If  we  do  meet  again,  we'll  smile  indeed  ;  ^""^v 

If  not,  'tis  true  this  parting  was  well  made. 
As  the  word  "  indeed  '*  is  pronounced  "  indade "  in  Ireland,  there  is.  reason 
•■egarding  it  as  belonging  to  the  same  category  as  saison,  raison,  mane,  baste,  tay,  ^c. 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  675 

Hamlet,  becomes  intelligible  only  when  the  word  "eager"  is 
pronounced  "  aygre,"  and  so  seems  to  be  identical  with  the 
French  "  aigre,"  sharp  or  biting.  If  further  evidence  were 
required  to  show  that  formerly  the  letters  "  ea  "  represented 
the  sound  of  **a  "  as  in  "  fate,"  it  would  be  found  in  the  fact 
that  in  Pepys's  Diary  the  word  '•  skate  "  is  spelled  in  one  place 
"  skeat,"  in  another,  "  scate."  It  is  clear,  again,  that  the 
word  "beast  "was  pronounced  "  bayst,"  though  the  play  on 
the  words  "  best "  and  "  beast "  in  "  Midsummer-Night's  Dream" 
(see  the  comments  on  Pyramus  and  Thisbe  as  represented  by 
Bottom,  Quince,  and  Company)  is  not  made  much  clearer  by 
the  change.  Still  "  bayst "  is  nearer  in  sound  than  "  beast  "  to 
the  word  "  best,"  even  as  now  pronounced,  and  probably  best 
was  formerly  pronounced  with  a  longer  and  more  open  "  e  " 
sound  than  now. 

In  passing,  we  may  ask  how  the  word  "  master  "  was  origi- 
nally pronounced,  for  this  word  was  often  spelled  "  mester," 
though  oftener  "  maister  "  and  "  maystre."  Derived  from  the 
French  "  maitre "  (contracted  from  "  maistre,"  as  in  the  old 
French),  we  can  have  little  if  any  doubt  that  the  word  was 
originally  pronounced  "mayster,"  which  would  as  readily  be 
corrupted  in  one  direction  into  "  mester  "  and  "  mister,"  as, 
in  the  other  direction,  into  the  modern  pronunciation,  "  mas- 
ter "  ("  a  "  as  in  "  father,"  not  as  in  "  fat ").  It  is  probable  that 
the  Scottish  pronunciation  of  the  word  is  much  nearer  to  that 
prevalent  in  England  three  centuries  ago,  and  still  nearer  that 
prevalent  in  the  time  of  Chaucer  and  Gower,  than  is  our 
modern  English  pronunci?ition. 

In  a  similar  way  other  vowel  sounds  might  be  discussed, 
but  this  would  take  me  too  far  from  my  subject — ^which,  in- 
deed I  have  not  yet  reached.  Before  passing  to  it  let  me  note, 
however,  that  consonantal  as  well  as  vowel  sounds  have  un- 
dergone alteration  in  England  during  the  last  few  centuries. 
We  have  evidence  of  this  in  the  familiar  passage  in  "Love's 
Labour's  Lost,"  where  exception  is  taken  by  the  pedant  to  the 


6/6  THE  LIBRA K  Y  MAGAZINE, 

pronunciation  "nebour"  for  "neighbor,"  "cauf  "for  "calf," 
and  so  forth,  showing  that  formerly  the  letters  "gh"  in 
"  neighbor "  and  other  such  words  were  sounded  (probably 
gutturally,  as  in  the  Scottish  "  lough,"  etc.)»  and  that  the  letter 
*'  1 "  was  sounded  in  many  words  in  which  it  is  now  silent.*  It 
may  be  noticed,  however,  that  "  1 "  had  became  silent  in  some 
words  in  past  times  to  which  it  has  now  been  restored.  For 
instance,  most  persons  now  pronounce  the  letter  **  1 "  in  the 
name  Ralph,  probably  because  the  name  is  oftener  seen  than 
heard ;  formerly  this  name  was  always  pronounced  Rafe  or 
Rahf.  So,  it  is  clear  from  a  well-known  passage  in  the  play 
of  Henry  VI.  (only  in  small  part  from  Shakespeare's  hand) 
that  the  name  "  Walter  "  was  formerly  pronounced  "Water," 
— as  indeed  might  almost  have  been  inferred  from  its  former 
abbreviation  into  Wat — for,  if  it  had  been  pronounced  Wal- 
ter, the  natural  abbreviation  would  have  been  Wally  ot  Wal'r 
(as  Captain  Cuttle  called  Walter  Gay).  The  prophecy  that 
the  Earl  of  Suffolk  would  "  die  by  water  "  would  certainly  not 
have  been  regarded  as  fulfilled  when  he  was  beheaded  by  the 
order  of  Captain  Walter,  if  the  name  had  not  been  pronounced 
"  Water  "  in  those  times.t 

These  considerations  respecting  the  changes  which  our  lan- 
guage has  undergone — perhaps  nowhere  more  than  in   the 

♦  There  arc  good  reasohs  for  believing  that  the  letter  "  r  "  was  formerly  pronounced 
much  more  fully  than  at  present.  Certainly  our  modern  *^  r"  could  not  properly  be 
called  the  "  dog's  letter,"  as  the  nurse  in  **  Romeo  and  Juliet  **  tells  us  it  was  called 
(**  r  is  for  the  dog,*'  etc.).  We  may  thus  explain  the  play  on  words  in  the  passage 
where  Celia  ridicules  the  affected  pronunciation  of  Monsieur  Le  Beau.  **  Fair  prin* 
cess,"  he  says,  '*  you  have  lost  much  good  sport  '*  (not  pronouncing  the  "  r**  rollingly, 
as  was  doubtless  then  the  fashion,  but  "  spo't  "  :  to  which  Celia  replies,  **  Spot  !  of 
what  color?"  to  the  perplexity  of  Le  Beau,  as  to  that  of  many  readers  of  Shake- 
speare. In  passing,  it  may  be  noticed  that  many  passages  in  Shakespeare  are  rendered 
obscure  by  changes  of  pronunciation.  Thus  where  Beatrice  says :  **  The  Count  is 
neither  sad,  nor  sick,  nor  merry,  nor  well ;  but  civil  Count,  civil  as  an  orange,  and 
something  of  that  jealous  complexion,'*  we  are  apt  to  overlook  the  play  on  the  words 
*'  civil"  and  " Seville." 
t  The  passage  runs  thus : — 

Suf.  Look  on  my  George,  I  am  a  gentleman ; 

Rate  me  at  what  thou  wilt  thou  shalt  be  paid. 

IVhii.  And  so  am  I ;  my  name  is  Walter  Whitmore. 

How  now  ?    Why  start'st  thou  ?    What,  doth  death  affright  ? 


sENGLISH,  ANI?  AMERICAN-  ENGLISH,  677 

neighborhood  of  the  metropolis — have  been  suggested  to  my 
iwinci  by  certuin  remarks  made  by  an  American  writer — Mr. 
F.  B.  Wilkie,  of  the  Chicago  Times — respecting  our  English 
way  of  pronouncing  the  English  language  as  compared  with 
the  American  method,  which  he  regards  as  on  the  whole  more 
correct. 

I  must  premise  that  Mr.  Wilkie'swork,  •'  Sketches  beyond 
the  Sea,"  though  it  opens  in  a  tone  very  unfavorable  to  the 
English  people,  shows  considerable  fairness,  on  the  whole. 
English    manners  are  not,   perhaps,  calculated  to   impress 

Suf.  Thy  name  affrights  mc.  in  whose  sound  is  death. 

A  cunning  man  did  calculate  my  birth, 

And  told  me  that  by  water  I  should  die. 

Yet  let  not  this  make  thee  be  bloody  minded  ; 

Thy  name  is  Gualtt'er^  being  rightly  sounded. 

IV/iit.  Gualtier  or  Walitr^  which  it  is  I  care  not,  etc. 

This  reference  to  the  sound  of  the  word  leaves  no  doubt  that  it  was  formerly  pro- 
nounced Water.  (So  Gualtier  is  sounded  Guautier,-and  has  come  to  be  spelled  Gau- 
thier  ) 

And  here  it  may  be  asked  whether  the  word  "  halter  "  was  not  formerly  pronounced 
hatUer  (rhyming  with  daughter^  watery  etc.).    For  Lear's  Fool  sings : 

A  fox  when  one  has  caught  her, 
And  such  a  daughter 
Should  sure  to  the  slaughter. 
If  my  cap  could  buy  a  halter, 
So  the  fool  follows  after. 
'*  After,**  probably  pronounced  as  by  the  vulgar  in  our  own  time,  a^ter.    That  "  f " 
before  **t*'  was  silent  in  common  speaking,  seems  shown  by  Wat  Whitmore*s  remark 
to  Suffolk :  ^*  Come,  Suffolk,  I  must  waft  thee  (wa't  thee)  to  thy  death.'* 

Nursery  rhymes  may  perhaps  seem  an  unlikely  source  of  information  respecting  pro- 
nunciation, yet  there  are  good  reasons  for  believing  that  many  old  usages  are  preserved 
in  those  ancient  rhymes.  In  particular,  we  may  be  sure  that  the  rhyming  if  not  per- 
fect, would  be  such  as  to  appeal  readily  to  the  ear.  Now,  in  Jack  and  Jill  we  find 
**  after  *'  rhymed  to  "  water." 

In  passing,  it  may  be  noticed  that  in  Shakespeare's  time  the  "  1 "  in  "  would  "  and 
"should  "was  probably  sounded.  For  if  **  would  "  were  then  pronounced  as  in  our 
time,  "  wou'd,''  we  should  scarcely  find  **  wouldest  *'  abbreviated  into  **  wouPt,"  as  in 
**  Usunlet,"  act  v.  s.  i.: 

Woul't  weep  ?  woul't  fight  ?  wouPt  fast  ?  woul't  tear  thyself  ? 
WouPt  drink  up  esil  ?  eat  a  crocodile  ?  etc. 

In  further  illustration  may  be  quoted  the  old  lines  on  the  vanity  of  human  pride, 
inscribed  on  the  ruined  gate  of  Melrose  Abbey,  from  which  we  learn  that  either  the 
**  1  •*  was  sounded  in  **  would  "  or  dropped  in  "  gold  " : 

The  earth  goes  on  the  earth  glittering  with  gold : 
The  earth  goes  to  the  earth  sooner  than  it  would,  etc. 


678  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

strangers  favorably  at  a  first  view.  It  may  not  be  generally 
true  that,  as  Mr.  Wilkie  says,  "  one  who  visits  a  strange  coun- 
try encounters  first  its  most  repellent  qualities," — in  fact,  the 
contrary  is  sometimes  the  case  ;  but  this  is  certainly  true  of 
England  and  the  English.  Mr.  Wilkie  is  justified  in  saying 
that  his  "  fault-finding  is  confined  to  what  may  be  termed  the 
external  character  of  the  English,"  and  in  adding7  "  that  there 
,  is  no  partisanship  in  his  views,  because  he  has  nowhere  failed 
to  denounce  the  weaknesses  and  follies  of  his  own  country- 
men whenever  the  opportunit)'^  to  do  so  fairly  presented  it- 
self." Of  this  the  following  humorous  passage,  which  bears 
in  some  degree  on  the  question  of  the  American  way  of  speak- 
ing English,  may  be  cited  in  illustration  : — 

If  there  be  any  particular  thing  which  is  calculated  to  make  an  American  homesick, 
to  make  him  feel  he  is  indeed  in  a  foreign  clime,  it  is  the  entire  absence  of  profanity." 
(Would  this  were  as  true  as  it  is  complimentary  0  **  Except  what  I  may  have  over- 
heard in  a  few  soliloquies,  I  have  not  heard  an  oath  since  my  arrival  in  England.  The 
cabman  does  not  swear  at  you  "  {he  does,  though,  when  he  has  a  mind  ?)*' nor  the 
policeman,  nor  the  railway  employe,  nor  anybody  else.  Nobody  in  an  ordinary  con- 
versation on  the  weather,  or  in  asking  after  some  one's  location,  or  inquiring  after 
another's  health,  employs  from  three  to  five  oaths  to  every  sentence.  It*s  rather  dis- 
tressing to  an  American  to  get  used  to  this  state  of  things ;  to  talk  to  a  man  for  three 
or  four  minutes,  and  never  hear  a  single  *  d n ' ;  to  wander  all  day  through  the  pop- 
ulous streets  and  not  hear  a  solitary  curse  ;  to  go  anywhere  and  everywhere  and  not 
be  stirred  up  once  by  so  much  as  the  weakest  of  blasphemies.  What  wonder  that  the 
average  American  becomes  homesick  under  such  a  deprivation,  and  that  he  longs  for 
the  freedom  and  curses  of  his  perrary  home  ?  *' 

Mr.  Wilkie,  finding  that  many  words  are  pronounced  other- 
wise in  England  than  in  America,  and  starting  with  the 
assumption  that  the  American  usage  is  correct  where  such 
differences  exist,  arrives  at  the  conclusion  that  England  "is 
rapidly  losing  its  knowledge  of  English."  "  I  have  no  less  an 
authority  than  Earl  Manville,"  he  says,  "  for  the  statement 
that  educated  Americans  speak  the  English  language  far  better 
than  educated  Englishmen."  I  have  yet  to  learn  that  Earl  Man- 
ville is  a  very  high  authority  on  this  particular  question,  wheth- 
er from  his  exceptional  knowledge  of  the  English  language, 
or  from  the  opportunities  he  has  had  of  comparing  the  way 
in  which  that  language  is  spoken  in  England  and  in  America- 


ENGLISH,  And  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  679 

Not  for  the  present  considering  pronunciation^  and  taking 
the  English  of  those  who  are  recognized  as  the  best  writers 
in  that  language  as  the  best,  it  is,  I  believe,  incontestable  that 
on  the  whole  a  thoroughly  educated  Englishman  speaks  the 
language  more  correctly  than  even  the  best  educated  Ameri- 
cans ;  only  it  is  to  be  noticed  under  what  reservation  I  make 
this  assertion  There  are  usages  which  have  become  recog- 
nized in  America,  and  are  adopted  by  the  best  American 
writers,  and  which  are  thus  correct  in  that  country,  though 
not  in  accordance  with  the  rules  which — tacitly  or  otherwise 
— English  writers  follow.  They  are  correct  in  this  sense,  that 
they  are  in  accordance  with  general  custom,  "  quem  penes 
arbitrium  est,  et  jus  et  norma  loquendi."  And  although  it 
may  be  admitted  that  some  few  of  these  usages  belong  in 
reality  to  the  English  of  two  or  three  centuries  ago,  it  cannot 
be  denied  that  many,  if  not  most  of  them,  are  recent.  I  am 
here  speaking  of  the  form  and  construction  •f  the  language, 
not  of  pronunciation.  As  to  this,  it  must  be  admitted  that 
there  is  room  for  doubt  respecting  many  of  those  points  in 
which  the  two  countries  differ.  As  regards  a  few  doubtful 
words,  it  would  be  scarcely  worth  while  to  inquire,  but  there 
are  whole  classes  of  words  which  are  differently  pronounced 
in  the  two  countries,  and  it  is  in  many  cases  doubtful  whether 
the  older  (which  may  be  considered  the  true  pronunciation) 
has  been  retained  in  the  old  country  or  in  the  new. 

"  I  have  no  doubt  whatever,"  sa)rs  Mr.  Wilkie,  "that  were 
a  wall  built  between  England  and  America,  so  that  there  could 
be  no  intercourse,  in  two  or  three  hundred  years  a  native  of 
one  country  could  not  understand  a  word  spoken  by  the 
other."  Setting  aside  the  manifest  exaggeration  here,  and 
supposing  for  a  moment  that,  contrary  to  all  experience,  so 
short  a  time  as  three  centuries  would  suffice  to  render  the 
English  of  America  unintelligible  to  the  people  of  England, 
and  the  English  of  England  unintelligible  to  the  people  of 
America,  it  would-be  altogether  absurd  to  infer,  with  Mr. 


680  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

Wilkie»  that  "  this  would  be  because  England  is  rapidly  losing 
its  knowledge  of  English."  Nor  is  there  the  least  reason  for 
supposing,  as  Mr.  Wilkie  does,  that  it  is  because  ''  England 
has  no  dictionary,  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  has  a 
dozen,"  that  the  language  undergoes  continual  change. .  No  dic- 
tionary, however  excellent,^can  stereotype  a  language,  either 
as  to  the  usage  of  words  or  their  pronunciation.*  In  America 
changes  are  taking  place  at  least  as  fast  as  in  England, 
probably  faster.  Mr.  Wilkie  found,  he  says  (though  one 
wonders  where  he  can  have  obtained  such  experience),  that 
there  are  in  England  about  as  many  standards  of  pronunciation 
as  there  are  people  who  have  anything  to  say.  He  is  refer- 
ring all  the  time,  be  it  understood,  to  educated  Englishmen. 
Yet  he  can  point  only  to  a  few  words,  most  of  which  are 
seldom  used;  whereas  any  Englishman  who  has  traveled 
much  in  America  could  cite  dozens  of  words,  all  in  ordinary 
use,  which  are*diversely  pronounced  there  by  educated  per- 
sons. Thus,  I  have  heard  the  word  "inquiry"  pronounced 
"  inquiry,  "  quandary  "  pronounced  "  quAndary,"  "  vagary  " 
" vagary, "t  ^'towards  and  "afterwards"  pronounced  with  the 
stress  on  the  last  syllable,  "very"  and  "American"  pro- 
nounced "  vury  "  and  "  Amurican  "  (u  as  in  "  furry  "),  and  so 
forth,  by  educated  Americans ;  while  other  educated  Ameri- 
cans pronounce  these  words  as  they  are  usually  pronounced 
in  England.  "Gladstone  says  issoo"  remarks  Mr.  Wilkie, 
"  when  other  intelligent  men  say  tsshuJ*  He  might  have  added 
that  Lord  John  Russell  used  to  say  "  obleeged,"  as  many  old 
folks  do  still,  and  that  the  question  was  once  raised  in  the 
House  of  Lords  whether  the  word  "  wrapt "  should  be  pro- 
nounced to  rhyme  with  "  apt "  or  with  "  propt."    As  a  matter 

*  If  Mr.  Wilkie  had  been  at  the  pains  to  look  over  the  introductory  matter  m 
**  Webster's  Dictionary/*  he  would  have  found  that  in  quite  a  number  of  cases  wheitt 
ho— Mr.  Wilkie-^nds  fault  with  English  pronunciation,  Webster  is  against  hiai. 

t  We  see  here  the  e£fects  of  the  tendency  in  English  speaking  to  throw  back  lbs 
accent.    In  England  we  have  **  c6ntrary  **  now  instead  of  "  contrary  **  as  in  SI 
speare's  time:  compare  also  the  nursery  rhyme  *'  Mary,  Mary,  quite  oontitey/* 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH.         ^  68 1 

of  fact,  however,  Mr.  Gladstone  does  not  say  "  issoo,"  but 
"  issyou,"  which  is  probably  correct ;  at  any  rate,  as  much  can 
be  said  in  its  favor  as  in  favor  of  "  ishyou."  Of  course  "  issoo  " 
and  "  isshu,"  the  two  pronunciations  given  by  Mr.  Wilkie,  are 
both  as  utterly  wrong  as  "  Toosday  "  or  "  Dook,"  modes  of  pro- 
nunciation, by  the  way,  which  are  very  commonly  heard  in 
America. 

As  the  point  is  considered  next  by  Mr.  Wilkie,  though  not 
next  in  logical  sequence,  I  may  consider  here  his  reference  to 
the  pronunciation  of  certain  proper  names  in  England  which 
are  spelled  (and  he  considers  should  be  pronounced)  very 
differently.    Of  words  of  this  kind  he  cites : — 

"  Colquhoun  —  pronpunced  Calhoun  — (really  pronounced 
Cohoon) ;  Cockburn,  pronounced  Cobum  ;  Beauchamp,  pro- 
nounced Beechem;  Derby,  Darby  j  Berkley,  Barkley;  Hert- 
ford, Hefford  (where  can  he  have  heard  this }  rtartford.  of 
course,  is  the  accepted  pronunciation) ;  Cholmondeley,  Chum- 
ley;  Bouverie,  Booberie  (an  unknown  version);  Greenwich, 
Grinnidge ;  Woolwich,  Woolidge  ;  Harwich,  Harridge ;  Lud- 
gate,  Luggat;  (by  cabmen  possibly);  High  Holborn,  Eye 
Churn  (cabmen,  certainly) ;  Whitechapel,  Witchipel  (never) ; 
Mile  End,  Meelen  (possibly  by  a  Scotch  cabman) ;  Gloucester, 
Gloster;  Leicester,  Lester;  Pall  Mall,  Pell  Mell." 

He  might  have  added  **  Marjoribanks,  Marchbanks ;  Caven- 
dish, Candish ;  Salisbury,  Salsbury,"  and  a  host  of  other  names. 
But  he  mistakes  greatly  in  supposing  (as  he  appears  to  do) 
that  these  divergences  between  pronunciation  and  spelling 
have  had  their  origin  since  America  began — whether  we 
regard  America  as  beginning  in  the  days  of  the  Pilgrim  fath- 
ers, or  of  the  war  of  Independence.  Some  of  them  are  at 
least  five  hundred  years  older  than  the  States.  But  without 
expecting  from  every  visitor  the  antiquarian  knowledge  nec- 
essary to  establish  the  antiquity  of  the  older  of  these  modes 
of  pronunciation,  we  might  fairly  expect  that  a  literary  man 
should  be  acquainted  with  the  fact,  that  Shakespeare  knew  no 


682  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE.        . 

trisyllabic  Gloucester  or  Salisbury,  that  with  him,  Warwick 
wasWarrik,  Abergavenh)'-  Abergany,  and  so  forth. 

If  aught  of  blame  is  deserved  for  the  continued  use  of  old- 
forms  of  spelling  when  the  old  modes  of  pronunciation  have 
passed  away,or  for  any  divergence  (no  matter  how  caused) 
between  pronunciation  and  spelling,  we  may  meet  the  Amer- 
ican with  a  tu  quoque ;  we  may  say  to  himy-  * 

Mutato  nomine,  de  te 
Fabula  nairatur.  ^ 

For  either  within  the  brief  duration  of  our  cousin's  own  his- 
tory, the  pronunciation  of  many  proper  names  has  diverged 
from  their  spelling,  or  else  those  names  were  originally  mo.st 
incorrectly  spelled.  How  otherwise  does  it  happen  that  the 
true-born  American  speaks  of  Connetticut  instead  of  Connec- 
ticut, of  Cincinnatah  instead  of  Cincinnati  of  Mishigan,  Miz- 
zouri  (in  the  South  and  West,  Missouri  is  called  Mizzoorah), 
Sheecahgo,  Arkansaw,  Terryhote,  and  Movey  Star,  instead 
of  Michigan,  Missouri,  Chicago,  Arkansas,  Terre  Haute,  and 
Mauvaises  Terres  (pronouncing  thie  last  two  words  as  French.) 
Taking  other  than  proper  names,  Mr.  Wilkie  seems  scarcely 
to  have  caught  in  many  cases  the  true  English  pronunciation. 
For  instance,  one  of  the  most  marked  differences  between 
English  pronunciation  and  that  with  which  Mr.  Wilkie  would 
have  become  fahiiliar  at  Chicago,  is  found  in  the  sound  of  the 
vowel  "a"  in  such  words  as  "bath,"  "path,"  "class,"  etc. 
Now,  although  he  mentions  in  one  place  that  the  "  a  "  in  the 
word  "  classes  "  is  pronounced  like  the  "  a  "  in  "  father"  (which 
is  right),  he  adds  even  there  that  the  sound  of  the  word  is 
almost  like  "closses,"  which  is  altogether  wrong;  while  else- 
where he  says  that  the  "a"  is  pronounced  like  the  "a"  in 
"  all,"  or  as  "  aw."  He  gives  "  nawsty  "  as  the  English  pro- 
nunciation of  the  word  "  nasty."  He  says,  "  an.  Englishman 
must  inform  some  of  his  acquaintances  during  each  day  some- 
thing about  his  bath,  the  a  being  sounded  like  a  in  -alL  Of 
course,  no  educated  Englishman  ever  pronounces  the  "a**.m 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH.  683 

"  bath/'  "  path/*  etc.,  like  the  "  a  "  in." all ";  nor.  indeed,  have  I 
ever*  heard  an  uneducated  Englishman  so  speak,  though  it  is 
likely  enough  there  may  be  dialects  having  this  pronunciation. 
In  fact,  the  story  of  the  clergyman  who,  when  asked  whether 
he  would  be  bishop  of  Bath  or  of  Wells,  answered  "  Bawth, 
my  Lord,"  and  so  became  the  first  bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells, 
whether  true  or  false  as  a  story,  serves  to  show  that  the  word 
is  sometimes  pronounced  "  bawth."  But  certainly  this  is  not 
the  usual  way  of  pronouncing  it  in  this  countiy.  To  Ameri- 
can or  rather -to  Western  ears  there  must,  it  should  seem,  be 
some  resemblance  between  the .  sound  of  "  a  "  in  "  class," 
"  path,"  etc.,  as  Englishmen  pronounce  the  vowel,  and  the 
sound  of  the  vowel  "o";  for  I  remember  that  when  once  in 
Illinois  I  asked  where  the  "  office  clerk  "  was,  the  office  dock 
was  shown  to  me.  It  is,  by  the  way,  somewhat  difficult  to 
understand  how  the  "e  "  in  the  words  clerk,  Derby,  Hertford, 
etc.,  has  come  in  England  to  have  the  sound  of  "  a  "  in  class, 
father,  etc.  So  far  as  I  know,  this  usage  is  nowhere  followed 
in  America.*  But  the  pronunciation  of  "a"  in  bath,  class, 
etc.,  like  "  a  "  in  "  father,"  though  it  seems  to  have  sounded 
strange  in  Mr.  Wilkie's  Western  ears,  is  common  enough — is, 
indeed,  the  accepted  usage — in  the  Eastern  States.  It  is  also 
the  usage  sanctioned  by  Webster. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  Mr.  Wilkie  represents  the 
omission  and  misuse  of  the  aspirate  as  though  they  were  as 
comipon  amongst  the  educated  as  among  the  uneducated 
classes  of  this  country.  A  hasty  reader  might,  indeed,  rashly 
infer  from  some  passages  in  Mr.  Wilkie's  book  that  there  is  a 
diflference  between  the  ignorant  and  the  decently  educated  in 
this  respect.  For  instance,  in  a  rather  overdrawn  scene  in 
Westminster  Hall,  a  policeman  tells  Mr.  Wilkie  and  Mr.  Hat- 

*  The" fact  that  the  proper  name  Clark  (which  Is  unquestionably  the  equivalent  of 
clerk)  has  been  for  hundreds  of  years  in  use  in  Eng^land,  shows  that  the  pronunciation 
Clark  is  hundreds  of  years  old.  So  also  the  existence  of  an  American  Hartford 
showA  that  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  called  Hertford  Hartford.  Probably  the  "  a  "  in  such 
words  as  Clark,  farm,  etc.,  had  originally  the  sound  of  "  a  **  in  "^  care."  Indeed,  if 
we  consider  the  French  origin  of  these  words  we  see  that  this  must  have  been  so. 


684  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

ton  to  "pass  into  the  'all ; "  to  which,  not  Mr.  Wilkie,  but  the 
Englishman,  Mr.  Hatton,  replies,  "  Pass  into  the  'all !  I  say, 
bobby,  my  boy,  you  dropped  something.  You  dropped  an 
aitch.  But  never  mind !  You  just  go  into  the  House,  and 
you'll  find  the  floor  covered  with  ^//r^^f-y  dropped  by  the  mem- 
bers. You  can  find  there  twice  as  many  as  you've  lost  here. 
Pass  into  the  ^a — a — all!  "  But  then  it  is  only  to  be  inferred 
from  this,  that  by  associating  with  his  American  friend,  Mr. 
Wilkie,  Mr.  Hatton  had  learned  to  speak  more  correctly,  than 
other  Englishmen.  It  was  in  this  way  that  Americans  ex- 
plained the  fact  that  Mrs.  Trollope  used  the  aspirate  correctly. 
And  to  this  day  it  is  the  prevalent  (and  almost  universal) 
opinion  in  America  that  all  Englishmen,  educated  as  well  as 
uneducated,  drop  their  atiches,  and  insert  atiches  vrhtrt  none 
should  be.  I  have  been  gravely  assured  time  and  again  by 
Americans,  claiming  at  any  rate  to  be  decently  well  informed, 
that  I  have  no  trace  left  of  the  "  English  accent,"  which  they 
explain  as  chiefly  to  be  known^by  omitted  and  misused  aspir- 
ates. They  neither  know,  for  the  most  part,  that  the  omission 
or  misuse  of  the  aspirate  is  as  offensive  to  the  English  as  to 
the  American  ear  (more  so,  indeed,  for  to  the  American  it  is 
simply  laughable,  while  to  the  English  ear  it  is  painful),  nor 
that  the  habit  is  to  all  intents  and  purp>ose^  incurable  when- 
ever it  has  once  been  formed.  An  Englishman  who,  owing- 
to  imperfect  education  or  early  association  with  the  ignorant, 
has  acquired  what  Americans  regard  as  the  English  accent, 
may  indeed  learn  to  put  in  a  sort  of  aspirate  in  words  b^^n- 
ning  with  aitch,  but  it  is  an  aspirate  of  an  objectionable  kind 
— fully  as  offensive  as  an  aspirate  in  'heir,  'hour,  and  'honor. 
Thackeray  touches  on  this  in  one  of  his  shorter  sketches. 
The  habit  of  using  aspirates  in  the  wrong  place  may  perhaps 
be  more  easily  cured ;  but  as  this  habit  is  only  found  among 
the  very  ignorant,  while  the  habit  of  dropping  the  aspirate  is 
much  more  widely  spread,  the  opportunities  of  testing  the 
•matter  by  observation  are  few.    Many  who  drop  their  aiiclux 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH.  685 

know  at  least  where  the  attches  should  be,  and  by  an  effort  put 
in  unduly  emphatic  aspirations ;  but  probably  very  few,  and 
possibly  none,  of  those  who  put  in  aitches  where  none  should 
bj,  are  able  to  spell.  From  a  story  told  me  by  an  American, 
it  would  even  seem  that  those  who  thus  wrongly  insert  aitches* 
have  ears  too  gross  to  recognize  the  difference  between  the 
-x:orrect  and  the  incorrect  pronunciation.  He  told  me  he 
offered  an  English  boy  in  his  employment  ten  cents  to  say 
'* ^UK" " onion,"  '* apple ";  on  which  the  boy  said,  " Hall  right, 
hegg,  honion,  happle  ;  'and  us  hover  the  ten  cents :  **  "  No,"  he 
replied,  "  you  are  not  to  say  hegg,  honion,  happle,  but  egg, 
onion,  apple."  **  Well,  so  I  did,"  was  the  cheerful  response ; 
"j^ou  say  hegg,  honion,  happle,  and  Hi  say  hegg,  honion,  hap- 
ple."    But  very  likely  my  informant  exaggerated. 

It  should  be  noticed  that  in  one  respect  th6  English,  even 
when  well  educated,  are  very  careless,  to  say  the  least,  in  the 
use  of  the  aspirate.  I  refer  to  their  pronunciation  of  words 
beginning  with  "  w  "  and  "  wh."  We  often  hear  wAfn,  where, 
whale,  afhd  so  forth,  pronounced  like  the  words  wen,  were,  wail, 
etc.  Ip  America  this  mistake  is  never  made.  They  do  not 
pronounce  the  words  as  educated  Irishmen  often,  if  not  gen- 
erally, do,  hwen,  hwere,  hwale,  that  is,  with  an  exaggerated 
aspirate,  giving  the  words  with  a  whish,  as  it  were  ;  but  they 
make  the  distinction  between  "  w  "  and  "  wh  "  very  clear.  I  am 
inclined,  by  the  way,  to  believe  that  the  Irish  mode  of  pro- 
nouncing words  beginning  with  "  wh  "  is  in  reality  that  which 
was  in  use  in  former  times  in  England,  probably  at  an  earlier 
date  than  that  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers;  at  any  rate,  hwat, 
hwen, -etc.,  is  thes  spelling  in  old  English  and  Saxon  books.  ^ 
There  are  faults  of  pronunciation  which,  so  far  as  I  can 
judge,  are  about  equally  common  in  both  countries.     For 

♦  In  passing,  I  may  remark  that  the  word  ache  was  formerly  pronounced  aitch^  so 
that  the  word  ackfs  used  to  be  a  dissyllable.  Thus  Beatrice,  in  **  Much  Ado  About 
Kothing,"  says  she  is  exceeding  ill — not  for  a  hawk,  a  horse,  or  a  husband,  but  for 
that  which  begins  them  all, "  H,**  that  is,  through  an  ache  or  pain ;  just  as  two  scenes 
earlier  her  fellow-victim,  Benedict,  says  he  has  the  toothache. 


686  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE, 

instance,  "  sech  "  for  "  such,"  "  jest "  for  *'  just,"*  "  ketch  "  for 
"  catch,"  "  becos  "  for  "  because,"  "  instid "  for  "  instead," 
sometimes  even  "  forgit "  for  "  forget."  But  we  certainly  do 
not  so  often  hear  "  doo  "  for  "  due,"  "  soo  "  for  "  sue,"  and  so 
forth,  in  England  as  in  America.  "  Raound  "  for  "  round," 
"  claoud  "  for  "  cloud  "  is  very  common  in  New  England ;  but 
perhaps  not  more  so  than  in  certain  districts  in  England.  In 
the  Southern  States,  peculiarities  of  pronunciation  are  often 
met  with  which  had  their  origin  in  the  association  of  white 
children  with  negroes.  Among  these,  perhaps  the  most 
remarkable  is  the  omission  of  the  r  in  such  words  as  door, 
floor,  etc.,  pronounced  by  negroes,  do',  flo',  etc. 

Let  us  next  consider  the  different  use  of  certain  )vords  and 
phrases  in  the  two  countries. 

Mr.  Wilkie  says,  holding  still  by  his  calm  and  quite  errone- 
ous assumption,  that  tjie  change  is  all  on  one  side,  "  the 
difference  between  the  spelling  of  words  and  their  sound  is 
not  all  tl^re  is  to  prove  that  the  English  are  losing  the  Eng- 
lish language,  and  suBstituting  a  jargon  that  is  totally  unlike 
that  speech  bequeathed  to  us  by  our  Saxon  and  Norman 
ancestors.  What,  for  instance,  is  to  be  done  by  a  man  un- 
derstanding and  recognizing  the  English  of  Macaulay,  Long- 
fellow, Byron,  Lamb,  Whittier,  Grant  White,  and  the  expur- 
gated vernacular  of  the  venerable  Bryant,  who  finds  that  a 
street  sprinkler  in  England's  English  is  a  '  hydrostatic  van ' ; 
that  rails  on  a  railroad  are  '  metals ' ;  a  railroad  track  is  a 
line ' ;  a  store  a  *  shop  * ;  a  hardware-man  an  '  ironmonger  *  ? 
He  finds  no  policemen  here  but '  cpnstables.*  If  he  go  into 
a  store  and  ask  for  '  boots '  he  will  be  shown  a  pair  of  shoes 
that  lace  or  button  about  the  ankle.    There  are  no  groceries 

♦  It  is  worthy  of  notice  that  the  pronunciation  of  certain  vowels  depends  in  greiu 
part  on  the  consonant  which  precedes,  and  in  part  also  on  that  which  follows  the  vowcL 
Thus  the  u  in  such  is  often  mispronounced,  the  u  in  much  never,  the  u  in  Just  often, 
the  u  in  musi^  lust^  and  rust  never,  and  the  u  va  judge  seldom.    In  Arnica  "  jedge*' 

for  **  judge  "  is  pften  heard,  however.    So  no  one  ever  says  los  for  lawty  but 

say  b^^os  for  because,  and  ^cas  for  ""cause* 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH.  08/ 

or  dry-goods  stores.  Baggage  is  '  luggage ' ;  a  traveling-bag 
is  a  '  grip-sack '  "  (a  word  which  I  have  never  heard  out  of 
America,  and  which  I  believe  to  be  quite  unknown  in  Eng- 
land) ;  "  there  are  no  trunks,  but  always  *  boxes.'  A  freight- 
car  is  a  '  goods-van ' ;  a  conductor  on  a  'bus  or  railway  is  a 
'guard*;  a  street  railway  is  a 'tramway';  a  baggage-car,  a 
'  luggage-van ' ;  a  pitcher  is  a  '  jug ' ;  and  two  and  a  half  pence 
is 'tuppence  'apenny.'  A  sovereign  is  a  'squid"*  ('quid 'or 
*  couter  *  would  be  nearer  the  mark  if  we  must  consider  slang 
to  be  part  of  a  language) ;  "  a  shilling,  a  '  bob ' ;  a  sixpence,  a 
•tanner.*"  He  might  conveniently  have  added  for  the  in- 
formation of  Americans  who  wish  to  understand  English 
English,  and  of  Englishmen  who  wish  to  understand  American 
English,  that  in  England  a  biscuit  is  a  "  roll,"  and  a  cracker  is 
a  "  biscuit." 

Now,  all  this,  unless  it'is  intended  for  an  elaborate  (and  ex- 
ceedingly feeble)  joke,  is  absurd  on  the  face  of  it.  To  begin 
with,  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  any  authority  in  the  works 
of  Macaulay,  or  the  other  writers  named,  for  street  sprinkler, 
hardware-man,  groceries  and  dry-goods  stores,  trjiveling  bags, 
freight-cars,  and  street-railways.  But,  apart  from  this,  nearly 
all  the  words  to  which  Mr.  Wilkie  objects  are  much  older  and 
better  English  than  those  which  Americans  have  substituted 
For  instance,  the  word  "  shop  "  is  found  in  English  writings 
as  far  back  as  the  fourteenth  century,  whereas  "  store  "  has 
never  been  used  in  the  American  sense  by  any  English 
writer  of  repute.  Manifestly,  too,  the  word  store,  which  has 
a  wider  meaning,  and  has  had  that  meaning  for  centuries,  is 
not  suitably  applied  to  a  shop,  which  is  but  one  particular 
kind  of  store.  There  can  be  very  little  doubt  that  originally 
Americans  substituted  the  word  "  store "  for  "  shop,"  for 
much  the  same  reason  that  many  shopkeepers  in  England 
choose  to  call  their  shop  a  warehouse,  or  an  emporium,  or  a 
mart,  or  by  some-equally  inappropriate  name.  Again,  baggage 
and  luggage  are  both  good   English ;  but  on  the  whole  the 


^^ 


688^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

word  luggage  is  more  suitable  than  baggage,  for  goods  which 
have  to  be  conveyed  by  train  or  carriage  (one  may  say  that 
baggage  is  the  statical,  luggage  the  dynamical,  name  for  the 
traveler's  impedimenta).  Unquestionably  there  is  good  au- 
thority, and  that  too  in  old  authors,  for  the  use  of  both  terms. 
Of  course  we  have  trunks  in  England,  despite  Mr.  Wilkie's 
assertion  to  the  contrary ;  we  have  boxes  also ;  very  few 
Americans  can  tell  offhand,  and  many  do  not  know,  the  real 
distinction  between  a  trunk  and  a  box  ;  just  as  few^,  either  in 
England  or  America,  know  the  distinction  between  a  house 
and  a  mansion.  Freiglit-car  is  a  good  word  enough,— the 
freight  half  of  it  being  better  than  the  other,  for  the  word 
car  is  not  properly  applied  to  a  van ;  but  goods-van  is  in  all 
respects  better:  "freight"  is  a  technical  term,  "goods" 
every  one  understands,  and  "  van  "  is  a  better  word  than  "  car." 
The  word  "boot,"  again,  i^  properly  applied  to  any  foot- 
covering  (outside  the  sock  or  stocking)  which  comes  above 
the  instep  and  ankle. 

Turning  from  trivialities  such  as  these,  let  us  now  note 
some  points  in  which  English  and  American  speakers  and 
writers  of  culture  differ  from  each  other, — first  as  to  the  use 
of  certain  words,  and,  secbndly,  as  to  certain  modes  of  expres- 
sion. 

In  America  the  word  "  clever  "  is  commonly  understood  to 
mean  pleasant  and  of  good  disposition,  not  (as  in  England) 
ingenious  and  skillful.  Thus,  though  an  Am'erican  may  speak 
of  a  person  as  a  clever  workman,  using  the  word  as  we  dor 
yet  when  he  speaks  of  another  as  a  clever  man  he  means  in 
nine  cases  out  of  ten  that  the  man  is  good  company  and  well 
natured.  Sometimes,  I  am  told,  the  word  is  used  to  signify 
generous  or  liberal.  I  cannot  recall  any  passages  from  early 
English  literature  in  which  the  word  is  thus  used,  but  F  should 
not  be  surprised  to  learn  that  the  usage  is  an  old  one.*     In 

*  I  have  been  told  by  an  American  literary  man  that  twenty  years  ago  the  wocd 
**  clever  *'  in  America  always  meant  pleasant  and  bright,  whereas  it  is  now  f^enciaHy 
used  as  in  England.    But  in  the  West  it  generally  bears  the  former  sense. 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  689 

like  manner  the  words  "cunning  '*  and  "cute  "  are  often  used 
in  America  for  "  pretty  (German  niedlich)."  As  I  write,  an 
American  lady ,  Who  has  just  played  a  very  sweet  passage  from 
one  of  Mozart's  s5rmphonies,  turns  from  the  piano  to  ask 
whether  that  passage  is  not  cute,  meaning  pretty. 

The  word  "  mad  "  in  America  seems  nearly  always  to  mean 
"angry  " ;  at  least,  I  have  seldom  heard  it  used  in  our  English 
sense.  For  "mad,"  as  we  use  the  word,  Americans  say 
"crazy."  Herein  they  manifestly  impaired  the  language. 
The  words  "  mad  "  and  "  crazy "  are  quite  distinct  in  their 
significance  as  used  in  England,  and  both  meanings  require 
to  be  expressed  in  ordinary  parlance.  It  is  obviously  a  mis- 
take to  make  one  word  do  duty  for  both,  and  to  use  the  word 
"  mad  "  to  imply  what  is  already  expressed  by  other  and  more 
appropriate  words. 

I  have  just  used  the  word  "ordinary  "  in  the  English  sense. 
In  America  the  word  is  commonly  used  to  imply  inferiority. 
An  "ordinary  actor,"  for  instance,  is  a  bad  actor;  a  "very 
ordinary  man  "  is  a  man  very  much  below  par.  There  is  no 
authority  for  this  usage  in  any  English  writer  of  repute,  and 
the  usage  is  manifestly  inconsistent  with  the  derivation  of 
the  word.  On  the  other  hand,  the  use  of  the  word  "  homely  " 
to  imply  ugliness,  as  is  usual  in  America,  is  familiar  at  this 
day  in  parts  of  England,  and  could  be  justified  by  passages  in 
some  of  the  older  English  writers.  That  the  word  in 
Shakespeare's  time  implied  inferiority  is  shown  by  the  line — 

Home>keeping  youths  have  ever  homely  wits. 

In  like  manner,  some  authority  may  be  found  for  the  Ameri- 
can use  of  the  word  "  ugly  "  to  signify  bad-tempered. 

Words  are  used  in  America  which  have  ceased  to  be  com- 
monly used  in  England,  and  are,  indeed,  no  longer  regarded 
as  admissible.  Thus,  the  word  "unbeknown,"  which  no 
educated  Englishman  ever  uses,  either  in  speaking  or  in 
writing,  is  still  used  in  America  in  common  speech  and  by 
writers  of  repute.    Thus,  in  Harper's  Monthly  for  May,  1881 


690  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE,  ■ 

(whose  editors  are  well-known  literary  men),  I  find,  at  page 
884,  the  following  sentenceln  a  story  called  "The  Unexpected 
Parting ofthe  Bsazley  Twins," — "  While  baiting  Lottie's  hook, 
as  they  sat  together  on  a  log  on  the  water's  bank,  he  told 
her,  almost  unbeknown  to  himself,  the  state  of  his  feelings.'* 

Occasionally,  writers  from  whom  one  would  expect  at  least 
correct  grammar  make  mistakes  which  in  England  would  be 
regarded  as  very  bad — mistakes  which  are  not,  indeed,  passed 
over  in  America,  but  still  attract  less  notice  than  in  England. 
Thus,  Mr.  Wilkie,  who  is  so  severe  On  English  English  in 
"  Sketches  beyond  the  Seas,*'  describes  himself  as  saying  (in 
reply  to  the  question.  Whether  Chicago  policemen  have  to 
use  their  pistols  much),  "  I  don't  know  as  they  have  to  as  a 
matter  of  law  or  necessity,  but  I  know  that  they  do  as  a 
matter  of  fact,"  and  I  have  repeatedly  heard  this  incorrect 
use  of  "as"  for  "that  "in  American  conversation.  I  have 
also  noted  in  works  by  educated  Americans  the  use  of  the 
"that"  as  an  adverb,  "that  excitable,"  "that  headstrong," 
and  so  forth.  So  the  use  of  "  lay  "  for  "  lie  "  seems  to  me  to 
be  much  commoner  in  America  than  in  England,  though  it  is 
too  frequently  heard  here  also.  In  a  well-written  novelette 
called  "The  Man  who  was  not  a  Colonel,"  the  words — "  You 
was  "  and  "  Was  you  ?  "  are  repeatedly  used,  apparently  with- 
out any  idea  that  they  are  ungraramatical.  They  are  much 
more  frequently  heard  in  America  than  in  England  (I  refer, 
of  course,  to  the  conversation  of  the  middle  and  better  classes, 
not  of  the  uneducated).  In  this  respect  it  is  noteworthy  that 
the  writers  of  the  last  century  resemble  Americans  of  to-day ; 
for  we  often  meet  in  their  works  the  incorrect  usage  in  ques- 
tion. 

And  here  it  may  be  well  to  consider  the  American  expres- 
sion "  I  guess,"  which  is  often  made  the  subject-of  ridicule  by 
Englishmen,  unaware  of  the  fact  that  the  expression  is  good 
old  English.  J+  is  found  in  a  few  works  written  during  the 
last  century,  and  in  many  written  during  the  seventeenth  cen- 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  69 1 

tury.  So  careful  a  writer  as  Locke  used  the  expression  more 
than  once  in  his  treatise  "  On  the  Human  Understanding.'* 
In  fact,  the  disuse  of  the  expression  in  later  times  seems  to 
have  been  due  to  a  change  in  the  meaning  of  the  word 
"  guess."  An  Englishman  who  should  say  "  I  guess "  now, 
would  not  mean  what  Locke  did  when  he  used  the  expression 
in  former  times,  or  what  an  American  means  when  he  uses  it ' 
in  our  own  day.  We  say,  "  I  guess  that  riddle,"  or  "  I  guess 
what  you  mean,"  signifying  that  we  think  the  answer  to  the 
riddle  or  the  meaning  of  what  we  may  have  heard  may  be 
such  and  such.  But  when  an  American  says, "  I  guess  so,-'  he 
does  not  mean  "  I  think  it  may  be  so,"  but.  more  nearly  "  I 
know  it  to  be  so."  The  expression  is  closely  akin  to  the  old 
English  saying,  "  I  wis."  Indeed,  the  words  "  guess  "  and 
'*  wis  "  are  simply  different  forms  of  the  same  word.  Just  as 
we  have  "guard"  and  "ward,"  "guardian"  and  "warden," 
"  Guillaume  "  and  "  William/'  "guichet "  and  "wicket,"  etc., 
so  have  we  the  verbs  to  "  guess  "  and  to  "  wis : "  (in  the  Bible 
we  have  not "  I  wis  "  but  we  have  "  he  wist  ")r  "  I  wis  "  means 
nearly  the  same  as  "  I  know,"  and  that  this  is  the  root  mean- 
ing of  the  word  is  shown  by  such  words  as  "  wit,"  "witness,** 
"  wisdom,"  the  legal  phrase  "  to  wit,"  and  so  forth.  "Guess " 
was  originally  used  in  the  same  sense ;  and  Americans  retain 
that  meaning,  whereas  in  our  modern  English  the  word  has 
change  in  significance. 

It  may  be  added,  that  in  many  parts  of  America  we  find  the 
expression  "  I  guess  "  replaced  by  "  I  reckon  "  and  "  I  calcu- 
late "  (the  "  I  cal'late  "  of  the  Biglow  Papers).  In  the  South, 
**  I  reckon  "  is  generally  used,*  and  in  parts  of  New  England 
"  I  calculate,"  though  (I  am  told)  less  commonly  than  of  yore. 
It  is  obvious  from  the  use  of  such  words  as  "reckon"  and 
"  calculate  "  as  equivalents  for  "  guess  "  that  the  expression 

*  The  first  time  I  heard  this  expression  it  was  used  in  a  short  sentence  singularly 
full  of  Southern  (or  perhaps  rather  negro)  phraseology.  I  asked  a  negro  driver  at 
the  Louisville  station  or  depot  (pronounced  depoe)  how  far  it  was  to  the  Gait  House, 
to  which  he  replied,. "  A  right  smart  piece y  I  reckon,^  ^ 


6g2  THE  URRARY  MAGAZINE, 

**  I  guess  "  is  not,  as  many  seem  to  imagine,  equivalent  to  the 
English  "  I  suppose  *'  and  "  I  fancy."  An  American  friend  of 
minp,  in  response  to  the  question  by  an  Englishman  (an 
exceedingly  positive  and  dogmatic  person,  as  it  chanced), 
"Why  do  Englishmen  never  say 'I  gtiess?'"  replied  (more 
wittily  than  justly),  "Because  they  are  always  so  positive 
abaut  everything."  But  it  is  noteworthy  that  whereas  the 
American  says  frequently,  "  I  guess,"  meaning  "  I  know,"  the 
Englishman  as  freely  lards  his  discourse  with  the  expression, 
"  You  know,"  which  is,  perhaps,  more  modest.  Yet,  on  the 
other  side,  it  may  be  noted,  that  the  "  downcast "  Aroericstn 
often  uses  the  expression  "  I  want  to  know,"  in  the  same 
sense  as  our  English  expression  of  attentive  interest, "  In- 
deed!" 

Among  other  familiar  Americanisms  may  be  mentioned  the 
following : — 

An  American  who  is  interested  in  a  narrative  or  statement 
will  say  "Is  that  so?"  or  simply  "So!"  The  expression 
"Possible!"  is  sometimes,  but  not  often,  heard.  Dickens 
misunderstood  this  exclamation  as  equivalent  to  "  It  is  pos- 
sible, but  does  not  concern  me ; "  whereas  in  reality  it  is  equiv- 
alent to  the  expression  "  Is  it  possible  ?  "  I  have  occasionally 
heard  the  exclamation  "  Do  tell ! "  but  it  is  less  frequently 
heard  now  than  of  yore. 

The  word  "right  "  is  more  frequently  used  than  in  England, 
and  is  used  also  in  senses  different  from  those  underst;ood  4n 
our  English  usage  of  the  word.  Thus,  the  American  will  say 
"  right  here  "  and  "  right  there;"  where  an  Englishman  would 
say  "  just  here  "  or  "  just  there,"  or  simply  "  here  "  or  "  there." 
Americans  say  "  right  away  "  where  we  say  "  directly."  On 
the  other  hand,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  the  English 
expression  "right  well "  for  "  very  well "  is  not  commonly 
used  in  America. 

Americans  say  "yes,  sir,"  and  "  no,  sir."  with  a  sense  diffeco 
ent  from  that  with  which  the  words  are  used  in  England ;  Iml 


ENGLISH,  AND  AMERICAN  ENGLISH,  693 

they  mark  the  difference  of  sens^  byva  difference  of  intona- 
tion. Thus,  if  a  question  is  asked  to  which  the  reply  in  Eng- 
land would  be  simply  "  yes  **  or  "  no  '*  (or,  according,  to  the 
rank  or  station  of  the  querist,  "  yes,  sir,"  or  "  no,  sir  "),  the 
American  reply  would  be  "  yes,  sir,"  or  "  no,  sir,"  intonated  as 
with  us  in  England^  But  if  the  reply  is  intended  to  be 
emphatic,  then  the  intonation  is  such  as  to  throw  the  em- 
phasis on  the  word  "  sir," — the  reply  is  "  yes,  j/r,"  or  "  no, 
j/r."  In  passing,  I  may  note  that  I  have  never  heard  an  Am- 
erican waiter  reply  "  yessir,"  as  our  English  waiters  do. 

The  American  use  of  the  word  "  quit "  is  peculiar.  They 
do  not  limit  the  word,  as  we  do,  to  the  signification  "take 
leave" — in  fact,  I  have  never  heard  an  American  use  the 
word  in  that  sense.  They  generally  use  it  as  equivalent  to 
*  " leave  off"  or  '*  stop."  (In  passing,  one  may  notice  as  rather 
strange  the  circumstance  that  the  word  "  quit,"  which  prop- 
erly means  "  to  go  away  from,V  and  the  word  "  stop,"  which 
means  to  "stay,"  should  both  have  come  to  be  used  as  signi- 
fying to  "  leave  off.")  Thus  Americans  say  "  quit  fooling  "  for 
"leave  off  playing  the  fool,"  "quit  singing,"  "quit  laughing/' 
and  so  forth. 

To  English  ears  an  American  use  of  the  word  "some" 
sounds  strange — viz.,  as  an  adverb.  An  American  will  say, 
**  I  think  some  of  buying  a  new  house,"  or  the  like,  for  "  I 
have  some  idea  of  buying,"  etc.  I  have  indeed  heard  the 
usage  defended  as  perfectly  correct,  though  assuredly  there 
is  not  an  instance  in  all  the  wide  range  of  English  literature 
which  will  justify  it. 

So,  also,  many  Ameticans  defend  as  good  English  the  use 
of  the  word  "good"  in  such  phrases  as  the  following:  "I 
have  written  that  note  good,"  for  "  well " ;  "  that  will  make 
you  feel  good,"  for  "  that  will  do  you  good " ;  and  in  other 
wayis,  all  equally  incorrect.  Of  course,  there  are  instances  in 
which  adjectives  are  allowed  by  custom  to  be  used  as  adverbs, 
as,  for  instance,  "  right "  for  "  rightly,"  etc. ;  but  there  can  be 


694  THE  LI  BRA  R  V  MA  GAZINE. 

no  reason  for  substituting  the  adjective  "  gfood  "  in  place  of 
the  adverb  "well,"  which  is  as  short  a  word,  and  at  least 
equally  euphonious.  The  use  of  "  real "  for  "  really,"  as  "  real 
angry,"  "real  nice;"  is,  of  course,  grammatically  indefensi- 
ble. 

The  word  "  sure  "  is  often  used  for  "  surely  "  in  a  somewhat 
singular  way,  as  in  the  following  sentence  from  "  Sketches 
beyond  the  Sea,"  in  which  Mr.  Wilkie  is  supposed  to  be  quot-* 
ing  a  remark  made  by  an  English  policeman :  "  If  policemen 
went  to  shooting  in  this  country,  there  would  be  some  hang- 
ing, sure ;  and  not  wholly  among  the  classes  that  would  be 
shot  at,  either."  (In  passing,  note  that  the  word  "  either  "  is 
never  pronounced  eyether  in  America,  but  always  eetker^ 
whereas  in  EJngland  we  seem  to  use  eithejr  pronunciation 
indifiFerently.) 

An  American  seldom  uses  the  word  "  stout "  to  signify  "  fat," 
saying  generally  "fleshy."  Again,  for  our  English  word 
"  hearty,"  signifying  '*  in  very  good  health,"  an  American  will 
sometimes  employ  the  singularly  inappropriate  word  "  rug- 
ged." (It  corresponds  pretty  nearly  with  our  word  "  rude  " — 
equally  inappropriate  in  the  expression  **  rude  health.") 

The  use  of  the  word  "  elegant "  for  "  fine  "  strikes  English 
ears  as  strange.  For  instance,  if  you  say  to  an  American, 
"This  is  a  fine  morning,"  he  is  likely  to  reply,  "It  is  an  ele- 
gant morning,"  or  perhaps  oftener  by  using  simply  the  word 
"  Elegant."    It  is  not  a  pleasing  use  of  the  word. 

There  are  some  Americanisms  which  seem  more  than  de- 
fensible— in  fact,  grammatically  more  correct  than  our  Eng- 
lish usage.  Thus,  we  seldom  hear  in  America  the  redundant 
word  "got"  in  such  expressions  as  "  I  have  got,"  etc.  Where 
the  word  would  not  be  redundant,  it  is  yet  generally  replaced 
by  the  more  euphonious  word  "  gotten,"  now  scarcel)'-  ever 
heard  in  England.  Yet,  again,  we  often  hear  in  America  such 
expressions  as  "  I  shall  get  me  a  : 
me  a  dress."  "  I  must  buy  me  that,*' 
••  me  "  forj;  myself  "  is  good  old  En^lii 


e  often  hear  in  America  such 
L  new  book,"  "  I  iiave  gotten 
:,"  and  the  like.    This  use  of        J 
English,  at  any  rate.  '   J 


^    DOGS  OF  LITEA  TURE,  695 

I  have  been  struck  by  the  circumstance  that  neither  the 
conventional,  but  generally  very  absurd,  American  of  our 
English  novelists,  nof  the  conventional,  but  at  least  equally 
absurd.  Englishman  of  American  novelists,  is  made  to  employ 
the  more  delicate  Americanisms  or  Anglicisms.  We  gener- 
ally find  the  American  "  guessing "  or  "  calculating,"  if  not 
even  more  coarsely  Yankee,  like  Readers  "Joshua  Fullalove  " ; 
while  the  Englishman  of  American  novels  is  almost  always 
very  coarsely  British,  even  if  he  is  not  represented  as  using 
what  Americans  persist  in  regarding  as  the  true  "Henglish 
haccent."  Where  an  American  is  less  coarsely  drawn,  as 
Trollope's  *'  American  Senator,"  he  uses  expressions  which 
no  American  ever  uses,  and  none  of  those  -  Americanisms 
which,  while  more  delicate,  are  in  reality  more  characteristic, 
because  they  are  common,  all  Americans  using  them.  And 
in  like  manner,  when  an  American  writer  introduces  an  Eng- 
lishman of  the  more  natural  sort,  he  never  makes  him  speak 
as  an  Englishman  would  speak ;  before  half-a-dozen  sen- 
tences have  been  uttered,  he  uses  some  expression  which  is 
purely  American.  Thus,  no  Englishman  ever  uses,  and  an 
American  may  be  recognized  at  once  by  using,  such  expres- 
sions as  "I  know  it,"  or  "  That's  so,"  for  "  It  is  true  " ;  by  say- 
ing "  Why,  certainly."  for  "  Certainly,"  and  so  forth.  There 
are  a  great  number  of  these^  slight  but  characteristic  peculiar- 
ities of  American  and  English  English. 

Richard  A.  Proctor,  in  the  Gentleman's  Magazine. 


DOGS  OF  LITERATUR. 

Ci-git  qui  fut  toujours  sensible,  doux,  fidele. 

Et,  jusques  au  tombeau,  des  amis  le  modele. 

II  ne  me  quitte  pas  quand  je  perdis  mon  bien. 

— C'etait  un  homme  unique  ! — Helas  !  c'etait  mon  chien. 

Epitapke  d'  un  A  mi\  par  Edmond  Dallibr. 

"  Epitaph  on  a  pet,  in  a  pet ! "  and  "  Cynical ! "  are  the  ex- 
clamations which,  in  spite  of  the  unpardonal)le  punning,  rise 


6g6  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

unbidden  to  our  lips  as  we  reach  the  concluding  word  of  our 
Byronic  quotation.  And  the  sentiment  embraces  just  as 
much  truth  as  is  commonly  wrapped  up  in  sentiments  that 
are  cynical.  Like  our  own  pessimist  Crabbe,  when  with  sim- 
ilar poetic  license  he  pictures  the  dog — 

Tie  only  creature  faithful  to  the  end — 

Dallier  is  using  the  teeth  of  the  "  friend  of  maa  "  for  the  pur- 
pose of  snapping  at  humanity ;  making  capital  out  of  canine 
fidelity  at  the  expense  of  thos^  who  had  doubtless  found  it 
hard  enough  to  be  true  to  him  in  spite  of  his  poetic  irritabil- 
ity; and  allowing  his  real  grief  for  the  death  of  his  favorite 
to  rise  to  fictitious  mountains  which  fall  on  and  cover  all 
remembrance  of  past  faithfulness  and  truth.  But  perhaps 
we  are  too  hard  on  the  peculiar  poet  nature,  "  Man  is  the 
god  of  the  dog,"  sa5rs  Bacon,  and  it  may  be  that  the  dog 
responds,  with  less  variableness  than  any  other  living  being, 
to  that  craving  for  worship  which  is  not  least  innate  in 
"  nature's  worshiper."  The  poet  is  no  Actaeon ;  his  darlii^ 
thoughts  are  not  torn  in  pieces  by  the  carping  Criticisnr  of 
his  own  hounds ;  he  himself  is  not  "  done  to  death  by  "  their 
"  slanderous  tongues."  Is  he  sensitive,  choleric,  revengeful  ? 
Then,  as  says  Dr.  John  Brown,  he  may  "  kick  his  dog  instead  . 
of  some  one  else  who  would  not  take  it  so  meekly,  and,  more- 
over, would  certainly  not,  as  he  does,  ask  your  pardon  for 
being  kicked."  He  may  read  the  "Scotch  Reviewers "  and 
thank  heaven  for  his  dog.  But  such  deductions  from  the 
poetic  and  literary  nature  must  not  be  pressed;  these  un- 
hinged intervals,  when  choler  smothers  affection,  and  the 
man  is  not  master  of  his  actions,  must,  even  in  p>oets,  be  rare ; 
for,  to  judge  from  the  investigations  which  I  have  made  into 
the  history  of  the  subject,  the  record  of  literary  men  and 
women  who  have  experienced  and  reciprocated  the  devotion 
of  their  dogs,  would  furnish  a  material  contribution  to  the 
"many  books"  of  the  making  of  which  "there  is  no  end:" 
nor. 


DOGS  OF  LIBRA  TURE.  69/ 

Had  I  e'en  a  hundred  tongues, 

A  hundred  mouths,  and  iron  lungs, 

could  I  venture  to  recite  the  innumerable  passages  in  which 
well-known  writers  have  used  their  pen  to  the  glory  of 

The  joy,  the  solace,  and  the  aid  of  man. 

Seldom,  indeed,  do  we  light  upon  any  revelation  of  antipa- 
thy. Macaulay,  however,  seems  to  have  been  bored  as  much  by 
a  dog  as  by  a  bad  listener,  or  by  any  person  or  thing  that  aided 
and  abetted  bad  listening.  His  definition  of  a  dog  as  "  an 
animal  that  only  spoiled  conversation  "  is  quite  characteristic 
of  that  eminent  and,  withal,  monopolizing  talker,  who  would 
most  unreservedly  have  indorsed  the  parody,  "  One  man's 
pet  is  another  man's  nuisance."  But  Goethe's  feelings  had 
passed  the  bounds  of  boredom  ;  dogs  were  an  abhorrence  to 
him ;  their  barking  drove  him  to  distraction.  Mr.  Lewes  tells 
us  of  the  poet's  troubles  as  theatrical  manager  at  Weimar, 
when  the  cabal  against  him  had  craftily  persuaded  the  Duke 
Carl  August,  whose  fondness  for  dogs  was  as  remarkable  as 
Goethe's  aversion  to  them,  to  invite  to  his  capital  the  comedian 
Karsten  and  his  poodle,  which  had  been  performing,  amid  the 
enthusiastic  acclamations  of  Paris  and  Germany,  the  leading 
part  in  the  melodrama  of  "  The  Dog  of  Montargis."  Goethe, 
being  apprised  of  this  project,  haughtily  replied  :  "  One  of  our 
theater  regulations  stands,  *  No  dogs  admitted  on  the  stage ' ;" 
and  thus  dismissed  the  subject.  But  the  invitation  had  already 
gone,  and  the  dog  arrived.  After  the  first  rehearsal  Groethe 
gave  His  Highness  the  choice  between  the  dog  and  His 
Highness's  then  stage  manager ;  and  the  Duke,  angry  at  his 
opposition,  severed  a  long  friendship  by  a  most  offensive 
letter  of  dismissal.  He  quickly,  however,  came  to  his  senses, 
and,  repenting  of  his  unworthy  petulance,  wrote  to  the  poet 
in  a  most  conciliatory  tone ;  but,  though  the  cloud  passed 
away,  no  entreaty  could  ever  induce  Groethe  to  resume  his 
post.  Alfred  de  Musset's  dislike  of  dogs  was  intensified  by 
unfortunate  experience,  for  twice  in  his  life  a  dog  had  gone 


^8  '  THE  LIBRAE  V  MA  GA ZINE, 

near  to  wreck  his  prospects :  once,  when,  at  a  royal  hunting 
party,  he  blunderingly  shot  Louis  Philippe's  favorite  pointer; 
and  again,  when,  as  a  candidate  for  the  Academy,  he  was  pay- 
ing the  customary  visit  of  ceremony  to  an  influential  Immor- 
tal. Just  as  he  rang  at  the  chateau  gate,  an  ugly,  muddy 
welp  rushed  joyously  and  noisily  to  greet  him,  fawning  upon 
the  poet's  new  and  dainty  costume.  Reluctant  to  draw 
any  distinction  of  courtesy,  at  such  a  time,  between  the 
Academician  and  his  dog,  he  had  no  alternative  but  to 
accept  the  slimy  caresses,  and  the  escort  of  the  animal  into 
the  salon.  The  embarrassment  of  his  host  he  accounted  for 
by  the  barely  defensible  behavior  of  his  pet,  but  when  the 
dog,  having  followed  them  into  the  dining-room,  placed  two 
muddy  paws  upon  the  cloth  and  seized  the  wing  of  a  cold 
chicken,  De  Musset's  suppressed  wrath  found  relief  in  the 
re^^.rved  suggestipn — "  You  are  fond  of  dogs,  I  see."  "  Fond 
of  r^gs!"  echoed  the  Academician,  "I  hate  dogs."  "But 
this  animal  he#!"  ventured  De  Musset.  "I  have  borne 
with  the  beast,"  was  the  reply,  "  only  because  it  is  yours." 
"  Mine  ?  "  cried  the  poet,  "  I  thought  it  was  yours,  which  was 
all  that  prevented  me  from  killing  him ! "  The  two  men 
shouted  with  laughter;  De  Musset  gained  a  friend;  but  the 
dog  and  his  kind  an  enemy  more  bitter  than  before. 

Mr.  Tennyson,  again,  is  one  of  the  few  national  poets  whose 
writings  exhibit  a  striking  absence  of  any  tribute  to  the  dog, 
or  indeed  of  any  reference  that  is  not  merely  passing.  Take, 
for  instance,  the  brief  allusion  to  Cavall,  in  his  "  Enid/'  when 
Queen  Guinevere  is  listening  for  the  baying  of  "King 
Arthur's  hound  of  deepest  mouth."  But  the  aiigument  from 
silence  goes  for  nothing  save  to  remind  us  that  Mr.  Tennyson 
is  essentially  the  poet  of  the  deeper  thoughts  and  intents  of 
the  human  heart. 

Such  exceptions,  however,  only  bring  into  prominence  the 
rule  that  the  majority  of  our  masters  in  literature,  and  our 
poets  almost  to  a  man,  have  ma3e  dogs  their  personal  friends 


jk:-ii 


DOGS  OF  LITERA  TURE,  '       699 

in  real  life,  in  fiction,  or  ii;i  both.  Facile  princeps,  among  stich 
true  dog-fanciers  reigns  Sir  Walter  Scott.  So  great  a  fas- 
cination did  he  exercise  over  dumb  creatures,  that  even 
strange  dogs  in  the  Edinburgh  streets  used  to  pay  him  hom- 
age. Mr.  Carlyle  relates  how  a  **  little  Blenheim  Cocker," 
*'  one  of  the  smallest,  beautifullest,  and  tiniest  of  dogs,"  with 
which  he  Was  well  acquainted — a  dog  so  shy  that  it  would 
"crouch  towards  its  mistress,  and  draw  back  with  angry 
timidity  if  any  one  did  but  look  at  him  admiringly  " — once 
met  in  the  street  "a  tall,  singular,  busjMooking  man,"  who 
was  halting  by,  and  running  towards  him  began  "  fawning, 
frisking,  licking  at  his  feet,  and  every  time  he  saw  Sir  Walter 
afterwards  in  Edinburgh,  he  repeated  his  demonstration  of 
delight.*  The  genius  of  him  that  set  a  catalogue  of  ships  to 
music  would  be  needful  in  order  to  give,  in  attractive  detail, 
the  names,  description,  and  history  of  Scott*s  canine  associates, 
since 

Many  dogs  there  be. 
Both  mongrel,  puppy,  whelp  and  hound. 
And  "  dandies  "  of  degree. 

Washington  Irving  tells  us  of  the  "  whole  garrison  of  dogs, 
all  open-mouthed  and  vociferous,"  that  rushed  out  to  salute 
him  when  first  the  wheels  of  his  chaise  disturbed  the  quiet  of 
Abbotsford.  The  "  very  perfect,  gentle  knight "  is  a  standing 
refutation  of  Karr's  aphorism*:  "On  n'a  dans  la  vie  qu'un 
chien,  com  me  on  n'a  qu'un  amour."  The  death  of  a  dog,  it  is 
true,  brought  keen  sorrow  to  him.  "The  misery  of  keeping 
a  dog,"  says  he,  "  is  his  dying  so  soon ;  but,  to  be  sure,  if  he 
lived  for  fifty  years,  and  then  died — ^what  would  become  of 
me  ?  "t  When,  however,  a  dog  did  die,  he  vowed  no  per- 
petual widowhood,  but,  after  a  decent  interval,  the  vacancy 
was  usually  and  often  completely  filled.  Of  all  the  dogs  that 
live,  and  always  will  live,  side  by  side  in  his  memory.  Camp 

•  See  Mr.  Hutton's  "  Scott,*'  in  the  series,  "  Englbh  Men  of  Letters." 
t  Lockhart's  "  Life  of  Scott,"  has,  of  course,  been  freely  consulted. 


7O0  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA  GA ZINE, 

and  Maida  bear  the  palm.  Camp,  a  large  and  handsome  bull- 
terrier,  fierce  as  any  of  his  race,  but  with  children  gentle  as 
a  Iamb,  Scott  speaks  of  as  "  the  wisest  dog  "  he  ever  had  :  so 
marvelously  did  he  understand  spoken  language,  that  his 
master  used  to  make  him  an  argument  for  the  higher  educa- 
tion of  canine  potentialities.  Camp  once  bit  the  baker»  was 
beaten  accordingly,  and  had  the  enormity  of  the  offense 
explained  to  him  ;  after  which  he  never  heard  the  slightest 
allusion  to  the  story,  whatever  the  voice  or  tone,  without 
retiring  into  the  darkest  corner  of  the  room,  with  a  look  of 
the  direst  distress.  Even  amid  the  decay  of  advancing  age, 
his^  affection  and  sagacity  never  abated ;  and  whenever  the 
servant  at  Ashteil,  while  laying  the  cloth  for  dinner,  happened 
to  say  to  the  dog  as  he  lay  on  the  mat  before  the  fire, "  Camp, 
my  guid  fellow,  the  sheriff's  just  coming  hame  by  the  ford,"  or 
*'  by  the  hill,"  the  sick  animal  would  immediately  bestir  him- 
self, going  to  the  back  or  the  front  door,  according  to  the  (ii- 
rection  given,  and  dragging  himself  as  far  as  he  was  able,  to 
welcome  his  master.  During  the  whole  of  his  career  he  was 
Scott's  inseparable  companion  in  his  study  and  in  his  pro- 
tracted rambles  by  the  banks  of  the  Yarrow ;  and  his  deport- 
ment, when  the  rest  of  the  kennel  added  numbers  but  not 
dignity  to  the  company,  plainly  showed  that  he  held  himself 
to  be  his  master's  "sensible. and  steady  friend,"  in  favorable 
contrast  to  the  more  freakish  and  locomotive  members  of  the 
"  following."  At  his  funeral  the  whole  family  stood  in  tears 
round  the  grave,  and  Mrs.  Lockhart  recalls  how  her  father 
smoothed  down  the  turf  above  Camp  with  the  saddest  ex- 
pression she  had  ever  seen  on  his  face.  On  the  evening  of 
the  dog's  death  Scott  excused  himself  from  a  dinner  engage- 
ment, alleging  as  his  apology,  "The  death  of  a  dear  old 
friend." 

But  it  was  Maida  that  gave  rise  to  the  almost  proverbial  say- 
ing of  that  generation,  "  Walter  Scott  and  his  dog."  Th^ 
"the  grandest  dog  ever  seen  on  the  border  since  the  days  of 


DOGS  OF  LITERA  TURK,  701 

Johnnie  Armstrong,"  was  af  cross  between  the  wolf  and  the 
deer  hound,  and  so  huge  that  a  Yankee,  who  had  invaded 
Abbotsford  to  interview  its  owner,  declared  that  Maida  was 
**  pro-di-gi-ous  ! "  With  such  a  creature,  dignity,  one  would 
think,  "went  without  saying ;  **  yet  that  Maida's  dignity  had  a 
suspicion  of  cant  about  it,  and  was  partly  aimed  at  the  gallery 
is  a  fact  suggested  by  his  lack  of  that  calm  restfulness  which 
goes  far  to  complete  a  dignified  demeanor.  He  had  a  rooted 
objection  to  remaining  for  long  in  any  one  place  or  position  ; 
he  would  lie  stretched  at  the  feet  of  his  master  as  he  sat  wri- 
ting or  reading  in  his  study  chair,  but  would  move  whenever 
his  master  moved,  and  lay  his  head  across  his  master's  knees  to 
be  caressed  or  fondled.  Sir  Adam  Ferguson  tells  a  characteris- 
tic story  of  Maida's  spirit  of  unrest.  He  was  sitting  with  Scott 
and  Maida,  on  one  occasion,  in  the  rough,  smoking  study,  when 
Abbotsford  was  still  in  building;  outside  a  heavy  mist 
shrouded  the  whole  landscape  of  Tweedside,  and  distilled  in  a 
cold,  persistent  drizzle.  But  in  spite  of  external  gloom  and 
discomfort,  Maida  kept  fidgeting  in  and  out  of  the  room, 
Scott  exclaiming  every  five  minutes,  "Eh,  Adam!  the  puir 
brute's  just  wearying  to  get  out " ;  or,  "  Eh,  Adam !  the  puir 
creature's  just  crying  to  come  in  " ;  when  Sir  Adam  would 
open  the  door  to  the  raw,  chilly  air  for  the  wet,  muddy  hound's 
exit  or  entrance,  while  Scott,  his  "  face  swollen  with  a  grievous 
toothache,  and  one  hand  pressed  to  his  cheek,  was  writing 
with  the  other  the  humorous  opening  chapters  of  the  "Anti- 
quary.' "* 

In  the  Castle  Street  "den,"  Hinse  of  Hinsfeldt.  a  venerable 
tomcat,  fat  and  sleek,  would  generally,  when  Maida  was  in  the 
room,  pose  himself  on  the  top  of  the  library  ladder,  looking  on 
with  a  sedate  interest ;  but,  when  Maida  chose  to  leave  the  party, 
and  his  master  apprised  of  his  desire  by  his  thumping  the  door 
with  a  huge  paw,  "as  violently  as  ever  fashionable  footman 
handled  a  knocker  in  Belgravia,  rose  and  opened  it  for  him 

*  See  Fanny  Kemble's  ''*'  Reminiscences  of  my  Girlhood.*' 


702-  THE  LIBRAR  T  MA  GAZINE. 

with  courteous  alacrity,  Hinse  came  down  purring  from  his 
perch  and  mounted  guard  by  the  footstool,  vice  Maida  absent 
upon  furlough."  But  to  write  a  life  of  Maida  would  be  almost 
to  write  a  life  of  Scott  while  Maida  lived — "  so  pleasant  were 
they  in  their  lives,"  so  intimate  and  tender  and  unbroken  was 
their  intercourse.  Often  were  they  companions  on  the  same 
canvas,  till  Scott  grew  "  as  tired  of  the  operation  as  old  Maida, 
who  had  been  so  often  sketched  that  he  got  up  and  walked 
off  with  signs  of  loathing  whenever  he  saw  an  artist  unfurl  his 
paper  and  handle  his  brushes."  Maida*s  likeness  became  so 
cosmopolitan,  that  once  upon  a  time  a  friend  of  Scott's  picked 
up,  as  he  passed  through  Munich,  a  common  snuff-box,  price 
one  franc,  with  Maida  for  a  frontispiece,  and  the  superscrip- 
tion, "  Der  liebling  Hund  von  Walter  Scott  '* ;  "  in  mention- 
ing which,"  adds  Scott,  "  I  cannot  suppress  the  avowal  of 
some  personal  vanity."  While  the  dog  was  still  alive,  though 
failing,  and  only  now  and  then  raising  a  majestic  bark  from  be- 
hind the  house  at  Abbotsford,  a  statue  of  him  was  erected  at 
the  door.  Those  were  the  days  when  Scott  used  to  stroll  out 
in  the  morning  to  visit  his  "aged  friend,"  who  would  "drag 
his  gaunt  limbs  forward  painfully,  yet  with  some  remains  of 
dignity,  to  meet  the  hand  and  loving  tone  of  his  master,"  as  he 
condoled  with  him  on  his  being  "  so  frail."  But  the  end  came 
at  Jast,  and  Maida  died  quietly  one  evening  in  his  straw  bed, 
of  sheer  old  age  and  natural  decay.  The  epitaph  Lockhart 
suggested  over  toddy  and  a  Cigar^necessarily  in  Latin,  be- 
cause, as  Scott  said,  Maida  seemed  ordained  to  end  a  hex- 
ameter— 

MaldsB  marmorea  dormis  sub  ima^ne,  Maida, 
Ad  januam  domini  sit  tibi  terra  levis, 

and  which  Scott  at  once  Englished — 

Beneath  the  sculptured  form  which  late  you  wore, 
Sleep  soundly,  Maida,  at  your  master's  dooiy— 

has  been  made  famous  not  only  by  its  subject  and  its  authors^ 
but  also  by  its  false  quantity.     Before  many  hours  it  became 


DOGS  OF  LITERATURE.  703 

permanent  in  stone,  and  having  been  likewise  printed,  but 
not  accurately,  by  the  admiring  Ballantyne  in  his  newspaper, 
gave  rise  to  attack  and  even  to  defense — a  defense  including 
moreover  Ballantyne's  gratuitous  blunder  of  jaces  for  dermis. 
Scott  persisted  in  pleading  guilty  himself  to  janua,  adopting 
Johnson's  apology  for  a  veterinary  mistake — "  Ignorance, 
pure  ignorance,  sir ; "  and,  though  according  all  admiration  to 
the  accurate  knowledge  of  prosody  which  he  had  either  never 
acquired  or  had  forgotten,  he  playfully  wrote  to  Lopkhart 
(whom  he  begged  not  "  to  move  an  inch  in  this  coiftemptible 
rumpus  ") — 

A  fig  for  all  dactyls,  a  fiz  for  all  spondees, 
A  fig  for  all  dunces  and  Dominie  Grundys. 

So  much  for  Maida ;  and  if  I  nave  seemed  to  linger  unduly 
upon  this  particular  companion,  let  my  excuse  be  given  in 
the  words  of  Scott's  biographer :  "  So  died  his  faithful  friend 
and  servant,  Maida,  the  noblest  and  most  celebrated  of  all  his 
dogs — might  I  not  safely  say,  of  all  dogs  that  ever  shared 
the  fellowship  of  man  ?  " 

-  Perhaps  one  or  two  of  Scott's  less  conspicuous  canine 
favorites  should  not  be  altogether  passed  by;  for  example. 
Spice,  whose  history  demands  a  short  prologue.  An  eccen- 
tric Scotch  farmer,  named  Jamie  Davidson — ^the  genuine 
Dandie  Dinmont,  and,  after  the  issue  of  "  Guy  Mannering," 
known  by  that  name  alone  to  all  his  neighbors — was  the  pro- 
prietor of  what  Scott  terms,  "all  the  Pepper  and  Mustard 
family."  In  order  to  balk  the  Inland  Revenue,  or  for  some 
other  reason  not  assigned,  Dandie  had  but  two  names  for  his 
score  of  dogs — "auld  Pepper  and  auld  Mustard,  young  Pep- 
per and  young  Mustard,  little  Pepper  and  little  Mustard,"  and 
so  on-^and  when  on  one  occasion  the  whole  pack  rushed  out, 
incontinently  bewraying  to  a  passing  surveyor  of  taxes  their 
excess  over  Dandie's  return,  Dandie  hurriedly  brought  up 
the  rear,  with  the  exclamation — "  The  tae  hauf  o'  them  is  but 
whalps»  man  I "    Dandie  far  out-Scotted  Scott  in  submissive- 


704  THE  LIBRAR  V  MA  GAZJNE. 

ness  and  self-abnegation ;  for  "  he  b'lieves  it*s  only  the  dogs 
in  the  bink,  and  no  himser."  Scott  imitated  his  nomencla- 
ture only  so  far  as  to  "  stick  to  the  cruets  " ;  and  Spice  re- 
mains to  us  as  the  most  prominent  member  of  a  '  cruet"  of 
contemporaneous  dandies,  denominated  Pepper,  Mustard, 
Spice,  Ginger,  Catchup,  and  Soy. 

So  intimately  were  Scott's  dogs  bound  up  with  his  life  that, 
when  his  last  financial  difficulties  crowded  upon  him,  and  it 
was  for  a  time  in  his  mind  whether  it  would  not  be  best  to 
sell  Abbottsford,  the  thought  of  parting  from  "these  dumb 
creatures,"  moved  him  more  than  any  other  painful  reflec- 
tions ;  and  he  could  only  hope  "  ther6  may  yet  be  those  who 
loving  me  will  love  my  dog  because  it  has  been  mine." 
Before  he  ^started  as  an  invali<^  for  Naples,  one  of  his  written 
instructions  referred  to  the  management  of  his  dogs;  and 
again  and  again,  during  his  foreign  sojourn,  he  gave  strict, 
tender,  and  minute  injunctions  to  Laidlaw,  his  steward,  to  be 
"  very  careful  of  the  poor  people  and  the  dogs."  He  was 
always  thinking  of  them.  It  was  during  this  last  hopeless 
journey  that  he  spoke  to  the  large  Danish  hound  whick, 
stranger  though  he  was,  fawned  upon  him  at  ihe  Castle  of 
Bracclano,  of  his  "  fitness  as  an  accompaniment  to  such  a 
castle";  but  that  he  himself  had  "larger  dogs  at  home, 
though,  may  be,  not  so  good-natured  to  sttrangers."  It  was 
in  Naples,  too,  where  Sir  William  Gell's  huge  dog  used  to  be 
fondled  by  Scott,  and  talked  to,  and  informed  of  the  "  dogs  he 
had  at  home  "  ;  while  he  would  confide  to  Sir  William  how  he 
had  "  two  very  fine  favorite  dogs,  Nimrod  and  Bran" — "  so  laiige 
that  I  am  always  afraid  they  look  too  large  and  too  feudal  for 
my  diminished  income."  And  it  was  his  dogs  who,  as  the  last 
days  drew  near,  came  round  his  chair  and  began  to  fondle  him 
and  lick  his  hands,  while  their  dying  master  smiled  or  sobbed 
over  |;hem.  "  L'ami  des  chiens,"  par  excellence,  was  Sir  Wal* 
ter  Scott  in  the  world  of  letters. 

The  ruling  passion  transferred  the  portraits  of  Scott's  favo** 


DOGS  OF  LITERA  TURE,   '  70S 

tes  to  the  pages  of  romance  and  poetry.  There  is  not  a  novel  or 
a  poem,  among  his  chief  compositions,  where  "  the  inevitable 
dog,"  in  the  best  sense,  is  not  instinctively  allotted  a  place 
sometimes  as  almost  the  central  figure  of  the  story;  always 
touched  in  with  the  loving  and  admiring  hand  of  one  to  whom 
the  thought  of  a  dog  was  second  nature.  As  Adolphus  re- 
marked in  his  "  Letters  on  the  Authorship  of  Waverley," 
wherever  it  is  possible  for  a  dog  to  contribute  to  the  effect  of 
a  scene,  we  find  there  the  very  dog  that  is  required,  in  his  proper 
place  and  attitude.  "  Woodstock  "  would  be  shorn  of  half  its 
glory  if  it  were  robbed  of  Be  vis,  the  favorite  hound  of  the  cava- 
lier. Sir  Henry  Lee,  and  the  protector,  tractable  as  bold,  of  his 
fair  daughter  Alice ;  always  present  to  help  when  help  was  most 
required.  In  the  large  wolf-dog,  a  mastiff  in  strength,  al/nost 
a  greyhound  in  form  and  fleetness,"  when  the  story  begins — 
when  the  story  ends  "  his  eyes  dim,  his  joints  stiff,  his  head 
slouched  down,  and  his  gallant  carriage  and  graceful  motions 
exchanged  for  a  stiff  rheumatic  hobbling  gait,"  living  still,  as 
it  seemed,  only  to  lie  at  his  master's  feet  and  raise  his  head 
now  and  again  to  look  on  him — Scott  has  reproduced  our  old 
friend  Maida.  Sir  Kenneth's  title  to  be  hero  of  the  **  Talis- 
man" may  be  fairly  disputed  by  his  stag-hound,  Roswal— 
guardian,  almost  to  the  death,  of  the  English  standard,  when 
Sir  Kenneth  had  been  beguiled  by  the  dwarf  from  his  post  on 
St.  George's  Mount ;  and  the  detector  of  the  treacherous  Con- 
rade  when  all  the  Christian  princes  swept  in  long  review  and 
unconscious  ordeal  before  Richard  and  Roswal  in  his  master's 
leash :  a  dog  which  Scott  has  borrowed  last,  but  not  least 
"  nobly,"  from  the  stock  of  primitive  Aryan  tradition,  and 
which  has  found  its  counterpart  in  the  dog  of  Montargis,  the 
dog  of  the  old  knight  Sir  Roger,  in  the  story  of  Sir  Triamour ; 
and  in  other  heroic  dogs  of  earlier  and  later  romance.  Gurth, 
the  faithful  herdsman  of  "  Ivanhoe,"  would  seem  only  half 
himself  without  the  inseparable  Fangs,  the  ragged  and  wolfish- 
looking  lurcher,  half  mastiff,  half  greyhound,  who  is  presented 
L.  M. — 23 


706  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

to  us  at  one  time  in  the  midst  of  his  ludicrously  misdirected 
efforts' to  second  Gurth  in  collecting  his~  refractory  grunters  ; 
and,  at  another  time,  as  he  flies  wounded  and  howling  from 
the  presence  of  the  wrathful  Cedric,  leaving  Gurth  more  in 
sorrow  for  the  injury  done  to  his  faithful. adherent  than  for  the 
unmerited  gyves  on  his  own  limbs,  while  in  moody  helpless- 
ness he  appeals  surreptitiously  to  Wamba  to  "wipe  his  eyes 
with  the  skirt  of  his  mantle,  for  the  dust  offended  him."  And 
who  but  a  student  of  dogs  could  have  told  us  how  Juno — 
though  usually  holding  her  master  the  Antiquary  much  in 
awe— on  one  occasion,  while  the  Antiquary  was  in  full  decla- 
mation of  "  Weave  the  warp,  and  weave  the  woof,"  peeped 
several  times  into  the  room,  and,  encountering  nothing  for- 
bidding in  his  aspect,  at  length  presumed  to  introduce  her 
whole  person;  and,  finally  becoming  bold  by  impunity, 
actually  ate  up  Mr.  Oldbuck's  toast;  subsequently,  to  the 
accompaniament  of  a  shake  of  Mr.  Oldbuck's  fist,  and  the 
gibe,  "  Thou  type  of  womankind !  '*  scouring  out  of  the  parlor  ? 
But  a  whole  paper  would  hardly  suffice  to  give  a  worthy 
account  of  all  these  friends  of  Sir  Walter's  imagination.  The 
jealous  Wolf,  the  staghound  of  Avenel  Castle,  so  resentful  of 
the  love  of  his  childless  mistress  for  the  little  Roland  whom 
he  had  saved  from  drowning ;  Wasp,  the  rough  terrier,  the 
plucky,  watchful  alter  ego  of  Harry  Bertram  in  his  perilous 
wanderings  and  imprisonment ;  Yarrow,  the  sheep  dog,  whom 
Dinmont  was  "hounding  in  his  dreams" — "Hoy,  Yarrow, 
man — far  yaud — far  yaud" — when  Warp's  ominous  barkmg 
was  waking  the  echoes  of  Bertram's  cell,  and  compelling  the 
angry  challenge  of  the  jailer's  deep-mouthed  Tear'em  in 
the  courtyard  below ;  Plato,  whose  howling  provoked  Col- 
onel Manne ring's  somewhat  testy  reminder  that  an  Academic 
was  not  a  Stoic,  when  the  bungling  ecstacy  of  Dominie 
Sampson  had  spilt  the  scalding  tea  upon  the  favorite  span- 
iel;  Hobbie  Elliot's  Kilbuck,  the  deer  greyhound  Unl 
erroneously  fixed  his  fangs  in   the  throat  of   the  dwmifs. 


DOGS  OF  LITER  A  TURE.  /      70/ 

she-goat,  and  thereby  put  himself  and  Hobbie  in  bodily 
fear  from  the  dwarfs  dagger ;  Captain  Clutterbuck's 
dog  that  quizzed  him  when  he  missed  a  bird ;  Fitz-James's 
hounds  returning  "  sulky "  from  a  bootless  chase,  or  swim- 
ming "  with  whimpering  cry  "  behind  their  master's  boat ; 
the  English  deerhound  that  flew  right  "furiouslie"  at  the 
young  Buccleuch ;  Lord  Ronald's  deerhounds,  "*  with  shiver- 
ing limbs  and  stifled  growl "  in  the  haunted  forest  of  Glen- 
finlas;  Cedric's  "greyhounds  and  slowhounds  and  terriers, 
impatient  for  their  supper,  but,  with  the  sagacious  knowledge 
of  physiognomy  peculiar  to  their  race,  forbearing  to  intrude 
'  upon  the  moody  silence  of  their  master  " — Balder,  the  grisly 
"wolf-dog,  alone  venturing  to  presume  upon  his  privileged  in- 
timacy, but  being  repelled  with  a  "  Down,  Balder,  down  !  I  am 
not  in  a  humor  for  foolery";  the  Branksome  staghounds 
"  urging  in  dreams  the  forest  race  " ;  Ban  and  Bauscar,  the 
deerhounds  so  pathetically  inspired  to  the  chase  by  the  sweet 
singing  of  Daft  Davie  Gellatley ;  Stumah,  "  poor  Stumah  "  ! 
the  chief  mourner  at  the  bier  when  his  master  Duncan  is  laid 
out  for  burial  at  Duncraggan  \  "  Brave  Lufra," 

whom  from  Douglas's  side 
Nor  bribe  nor  threat  could  e'er  divide. 
The  fleetest  hound  in  all  the  North ; 

— ^all  these  and  many  more  give  Scott  scope  for  some  of  his 
happiest  and  most  natural  touches,  but  must  be  passed  by 
with  a  mere  allusion. 

The  name  of  Byron  suggests  to  us  at  once  his  dog  Boat- 
swain. But  Boatswain  was  not  alone  ;  the  Newfoundland  had 
one  or  two  smaller  satellites,  which  through  his  master  and 
himself  have  become  historical.  A  finely  formed  and  fero- 
cious bull-mastiff.  Nelson  by  name,  was  his  contemporary  and 
his  relentless  foe,  being  jealous  of  the  precedence  which  Boat- 
swain enjoyed.  When  the  muzzle,  with  which  it  was  usually 
deemed  advisable  to  "  fence  "  Nelson's  teeth,  was  exception- 
ally remitted,  dog  met  dog  without  a  moment's  delay ;  and  we 


708  THE  LIBRAR  Y  MA GAZINE, 

are  told  how,  morq  than  once  during  the  stay  of  Byron  and 
Moore  at  a  Harrogate  hotel,  the  two  friends,  the  valet  (Frank) 
and  all  the  waiters  that  could  be  found,  were  vigorously 
engaged  in  parting  them  ;  a  consummation  only  attained  as  a 
rule  by  thrusting  poker  and  tongues  into  the  mouth  of  each. 
But  one  day  Nelson  slipped  his  guard,  and,  escaping  from 
Byron's  room  unmuzzled,  fastened  upon  the  tiiroat  of  a  horse 
with  a  grip  that  would  not  be  gainsayed.  Away  went  the 
stable-boys  for  Frank,  who,  seizing  one  of  his/ lordship's  pis- 
tols, always  kept  in  his  room  ready  loaded,  solved  the  knot 
with  a  bullet  through  poor  Nelson's  brain,  to  the  deep  sorrow 
of  his  bereaved  master.  But  Byron's  devotion  to  dogs  was 
centered  mainly  in  Boatswain,  a  dog  whom  he  has  immortal- 
ized in  verse,  and  by  whose  side  it  was  his  solemn  purpose, 
expressed  in  his  will  of  1811,  as  Moore  tells  us,  to  be  buried. 
Byron  appears  to  have  been  won,  not  merely  by  Boatswain's 
unusual  intelligence,  but  by  his  noble  generosity  of  spirit,  both 
of  which  endowments  come  out  in  the  story  recorded  of  his 
relations  to  Gilpin,  Mrs.  Byron's  fox-terrier.  Lest  Boatswain's 
unceasing  assaults  and  worryings  should  finally  make  Gilpin's 
existence  impossible,  the  terrier  was  transferred  to  a  tenant  at 
Newstead ;  and,  on  the  departure  of  Byron  for  Cambridge, 
Boatswain,  with  two  other  dogs,  was  intrusted  to  a  servant 
till  his  master's  return.  One  morning,  to  the  dismay  of  the 
servant.  Boatswain  disappeared,  and  a  whole  day's  anxious 
search  did  not  avail  to  find  him;  at  length,  however,  as  even- 
ing came  on,  in  walked  the  stray  dog,  with  Gilpin  at  his  side, 
whom  he  forthwith  "  led  to  the  kitchen  fire,  licking  him  and 
lavishing  upon  him  every  demonstration  of  joy.  He  had  been 
all  the  way  to  Newstead  to  fetch  him,  and,  having  now  estab- 
lished his  former  foe  under  the  roof  once  more,  agreed  so 
perfectly  well  with  him  ever  after,  that  he  even  protected  him 
from  the  insults  of  other  dogs,  a  task  which  the  quarrelsome- 
ness of  the  little  terrier  rendered  no  sinecure  ;  and  if  he  but 
heard  Gilpin's  voice  in  distress,  would  fly  instantly  to  the  res- 


DOGS  OF  LITERA  TURE.  7C9 

cue."  At  Newstead  Abbey  Byron  would  often  fall  out  of  his 
boat,  as  if  by  accident,  into  the  water,  whereupon  Boatswain 
would  immediately  plunge  in,  seize  him  and  drag  him  ashore. 
Boatswain's  tomb  is  a  conspicuous  object  at  the  Abbey,  and 
the  inscription  in  verse  is  well-known,  with  the  misanthropi- 
cal bitterness  of  its  opening  couplets,  and  with  its  pathetic  and 
characteristic  conclusion : 

Ye  who  perchance  behold  this  simple  urn, 
Pass  on,  it  honors  none  you  wish  to  mourn  ; 
To  mark  a  frieud^s  remains  these  stones  arise 
I  never  knew  but  one — and  here  he  lies. 

The  prose  epitaph,  not  so  widely  known,  may  perhaps  be 
quoted  more  fully  :  "  Near  this  spot  are  deposited  the  remains 
of  one  who  possessed  beauty  without  vanity,  strength  with- 
out insolence,  courage  without  ferocity,  and  all  the  virtues  of 
man  without  his  vices.  This  praise,  which  would  be  unmean- 
ing flattery  if  inscribed  over  human  ashes,  is  but  a  just  tribute 
to  the  memory  of — Boatswain,  a  dog." 

J>Io  man  who  went  not  "  in  and  out "  with  his  dog  could 
have  written  "  The  Twa  Dogs."  The  poem  is,  first  of  all,  a 
tribute  to  Luath,  Burns's  favorite  collie,  who  had  been  wan- 
tonly killed  on  the  night  when  the  poet's  father  died;  but 
even  the  imaginary  Caesar — "  name  of  Scotland's  dogs,"  and 
"  keep  it  for  his  honor's  pleasure," — is  drawn  with  the  hand  of 
a  lover;  for  though,  as  "the  gentleman  and  scholar,"  he  "was 
o*  high  degree." 

The  fient  a  pride — ^nae  pride  had  he ; 
'But  wad  hae  spent  an  hour  caressin* 
Ev'n  with  a  tinkler-gipsy *s  messin'.* 
At  kirk  or  market,  mill  or  smiddie, 
Nae  tawted*  tyke,  though  e*er  sae  duddie^t 
But  he  wad  stan*t  as  glad  to  see  him. 

Luath^  on  the  other  hand, 

was  a  plowman's  collie. 
A  rhyming,  ranting,  raving  billie,| 
Wha  for  his  friend  an'  comrade  had  him, 
An'  in  his  freaks  had  Luath  ca'd  him 

♦  Small  dog.  *  Matted.  t  Ragged,  dowdy.  %  Companion, 


712        .  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  G4ZINE, 

and  has  bequeathed  to  us.  He  belonged  to  Roderick,  the 
last  king  of  the  Visigoths,  who,  having  escaped  in  the  guise 
of  a  peasant  from  the  battlefield  where  he  had  been  defeated 
by  Count  Julian  and  his  Moorish  allies,  returned  to  his  shat- 
tered kingdom  after  a  hermit  life  of  twenty  years.  Theron 
alone  knew  him.yet  not  even  he  at  once,  but  only  after  eying 
him  long  and  wistfully  did  he  recognize  at  length, 

Changed  as  he  was,  and  in  those  sordid  weeds. 
His  royal  master.     And  he  rose  and  licked 
His  withered  hand,  and  earnestly  looked  up 
With  eyes  whose  human  meaning  did  not  need 
The  aid  of  speech  ;  and  moaned  as  if  at  once 
.  To  court  and  chide  the  long  withheld  caress. 

The  unrecognized  king,  withdrawing  from  the  painful  and 
ineffectual  interview  with  Florinda  and  Russilla  his  mother, 
retired,  followed  by  the  dog, 

Into  the  thickest  grove  ;  there  yielding  way 

To  his  o'erburthcncd  nature,  f rOm  all  eyes 

Apart,  he  cast  himself  upon  the  ground 

And  threw  his  arms  around  the  dog,  and  cried, 

While  tears  streamed  down  :  "  Thou,  Theron,  thou  hast  known 

Thy  poor  lost  master— Theron,  none  but  thou !  '* 

Consciously  or  unconsciously  Southey  must  have  repro- 
duced in  some  degree  Argus,  the  friend  of  Ulysses,  and  of 
Homer  too.  But  with  Argus  there  was  no  delay :  straight- 
way, after  a  like  separation  of  twenty  years. 

He  knew  his  lord — he  knew,  and  strove  to  meet ; 
In  vain  he  strove  to  crawl,  and  kiss  his  feet ; 
Yet  (all  he  could)  his  tail,  his  ears,  hb  eyes. 
Salute  his  master  and  confess  his  joys. 
Sof*  pity  touched  the  mighty  master's  soul; 
Adown  his  cheek  a  tear  unbidden  stole. 

And  the  tenderness  of  the  poet  is  nowhere  rnore  contagious 
than  when  he  goes  on  to  tell  how  Argus,  taking  this  last  look 
at  his  master,  there  and  then  let  life  ebb  quietly  away. 

The  nervous  melancholy  of  Cowper  found  in  dumb  com- 
panions a  constant  source  of  relief,  and  the  debt  he  owed  to 
his  sprightly  spaniel  Beau  was  no  trifling  one.  The  graceful 
poem  which  has  given  Beau  a  lasting  fame,  though  of  no 
great  intrinsic   merit,   serves  to   bring  Cowper  within  oar 


DOGS  OF  LITER  A  TURE.  713 

favored  pale.  The  poet  and  his  spaniel  walking  by  the  side 
of  the  Ouse  on  a  soft,  shady  summer's  day — the  spaniel,  now  * 
**  wantoning  among  the  flags  and  reeds,"  now  almost  keeping 
pace  with  the  swallows "o*er  the  meads,"  now  marking  "with 
fixt  considerate  face  "  the  unsuccessful  pains  of  his  master  to 
reach  a  water-lily  that  "  he  wished  his  own,'*  and  setting  his 
"  puppy  brains  to  comprehend  the  case  " ;  and,  at  last,  on  their 
return  from  the  ramble,  spying  the  lily  once  more,  and,  after 
a  plunge  into  the  stream,  dropping  "the  treasure'*  at  the 
poet's  feet — all  makds  a  very  pretty  picture,  and  gives  us  an 
unerring  insight  into  the  love  of  Cowper  for  his  dog. 

Pope,  too,  was  a  man  of  dogs.  Every  one  will  recall  the 
inscription  on  the  collar  of  the  dog  presented  by  him  to 
Frederick,  Prince  of  Wales — 

I  am  his  Highnesses  dog  at  Kew ; 
Pray  tell  me,  sir,  whose  dog  are  you  ? 

The  feeling  thrown  into  the  translation  from  Homer  which 
we  have  quoted  above,  would  almost  stand  sponsor  for  his 
appreciation  of  canine  faithfulness  and  affection  ;  but  we 
have  a  real  friend  of  Pope  always  with  us.  His  dog  Bounce 
survives,  associated,  it  is  true,  chiefly  with  an  epitaph,  yet  the 
epitaph  speaks  volumes.  "  O  rare  Bounce,"  firsi  proposed 
by  Pope  as  a  multUm  in  parvo  eulogium  on  his  departed  favor- 
ite, was.  afterwards  abandoned  as  too  obviously  disrespectful 
in  its  allusion  to  "O  rare  Ben  Jonson  " — the  words  of  Shakes- 
peare, which  an  eccentric  Oxfordshire  squire.  Jack  Young, 
so  called,  on  passing  one  day  through  Westminster  Abbey, 
gave  a  mason  eighteenpence  to  cut  on  Ben  Jonson's  tomb — 
still  virgin  stone  on  account  of  the  tardiness  of  the  pubh'c 
subscription.  Belinda's  Shock,  on  the  other  hand,  kindles 
no  enthusiasm ;  but  the  true  feeling  of  Pope  can  hardly  be 
looked  for  in  a  mock  heroic  poem  like  the  "Rape  of  the 
Lock,"  where  the  by-play  of  a  grand  lady's  lap-dog  merely 
sets  off  the  company  of 

Puffs,  powders,  patches,  bibles,  billets^oux. 


714  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

To  assert  that  Shakespeare  drew  from  dogs  that  he  pos- 
sessed and  loved,  simply  because  he  describes  the  sportsman's 
comrades  and  pastime  with  such  technical  accuracy,  would  be 
a  perilous  conclusion,  considering  the  number  of  pursuits  to 
which  his  apparent  omniscience  has  consigned  him ;  but, 
unless  tradition  belies  him,  he  has  a  Charlcote  reputation 
which  tends  to  cumulate  the  evidence  ;  and  we  may  therefore, 
without  much  apprehension,  rest  satisfied  in  our  instinctive 
conviction  that  none  but  a  friend  of  dogs  could  have  ling-ered 
about  them  as  he  does  in  the  "  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  where 
the  sporting  lord  Charges  his  huntsman  to  "  tender  well  his 
hounds,"  while  master  and  man  discuss  fatigues  of  Merriman 
and  of  Clowder,  and  the  exploits  of  Silver  and  Belman  and 
Echo,  as  S5rmpathetically  as  if  these  fatigues  and  exploits  had 
been  their  own.  Equally  defensible  is  it  to  persuade  ourselves 
thiat  Shakespeare  is  harking  back  to  happy  memories  when 
Theseus  promises — 

My  love  shall  hear  the  music  of  my  hounds. 
And  mark  the  musical  confusion 
Of  hounds  and  echo  in  conjunction. 

And  when  Hippolyta  recalls  the  "  gallant  chiding  **  of  the 
hounds  of  Sparta,  baying  the  bear  in  a  wood  of  Crete,  and 
making  the  groves, 

The  skies,  the  fountains,  every  region  near. 
Seem  all  one  mutual  cry :  I  never  heard 
So  musical  a  discord,  such  sweet  thunder. 

Again,  it  is  Shakespeare,  so  to  say,  who,  in  Theseus's  reply, 
revels  in  the  beauty  of  his  hounds : — 

Their  heads  are  hung 
With  ears  that  sweep  away  the  morning  dew ; 
Crook-knee'd,  and  dew-lapp'd  like  Thessalianrtmlls ; 
Slow  in  pursuit,  but  match'd  in  mouth  like  bells 
Each  under  each.    A  cry  more  tuneable 
Was  never  holla*d  to  nor  cheer'd  with  horn 
In  Crete,  in  Sparta,  nor  in  Thessaly. 

In  the  "Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  Launce  supplies  an  xx\~ 
stance  of  dog-love  run  wild.  **  To  this  silly  semi-brute  fellow  " 
says  Gervinus,  "  who  sympathises  with  his  beast  almost  more 


DOGS  OF  LITER  A  TURE,  715 

than  with  men,  his  dog  is  his  best  friend."  Their  communion 
and  fellowship  is  so  human  that  Launce  is  seriously  hurt,  and 
indites  Crab  as  "  the  sourest  dog  that  lives,"  as  "  a  stone,  a 
very  pebble  stone,"  and  "  with  no  more  pity  than  a  dog,"  be- 
cause (he  adds)  "  my  mother  weeping,  my  father  wailing,  my 
sister  crying,  our  maid  howling,  our  cat  wringing  her  hands, 
and  all  our  house  in  great  perplexity,  yet  did  not  this  cruel- 
hearted  cur  shed  a  tear'; but  see  how  I  lay  the  dust 

with  my  tears  ! "  And  all  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  many 
a  time  and  ott  Launce  had  sacrificed  everything  to  Crab — had 
even  taken  his  faults  upon  him  and  submitted  to  stripes  in 
his  stead.  Can  we  doubt  that  a  real  feeling  lay  at  the  founda-  ^ 
tion  of  this  extravaganza,  in  which  the  force  of  dog-love  could 
no  further  go. ^ 

Smollett  must  have  had  many  a  merry  chuckle  as  he  de- 
veloped the  biography  of  Chowder  in  "  Humphry  Clinker." 
Chowder,  "  a  filthy  cur  from  Newfoundland "  (according  to 
the  unsympathetic  description  of  Jeremiah  Melford),  was  the 
treasure  of  Miss  Tabitha  Bramble,  who  having,  in  the  opinion 
of  the  same  correspondent,  "distinguished  this  beast  with  her 
favor  on  account  of  his  ugliness  and  ill-nature,  if  it  was  not 
indeed  an  instinctive  sympathy  between  his  disposition  and 

her  own caressed    him  without  ceasing,   and    even 

harassed  the  family  in  his  service."     Most  whimsical  is  the 

status  of  profound  importance  which  Chowder  holds  in  the 

letters  of  Tabitha  and  her  Malapropian  servants — with  their 

detailed    instructions    concerning    Chowder's  ailments,   his 

medicines,  and  his  treatment — their  deep  distress  when  he  is 

ill,  their  devout  thankfulness  on  his  recovery.     For  example, 

Jenkins,  in  attendance  upon  the  Brambles  at  the  Bath  waters, 

writes  to  Molly  Jones,  the  housekeeper  at  Brambleton  Hall, 

\n  this  strain  :  "  As  for  house  news,  the  worst  is  Chowder  has 

lan^.allen  off  greatly  from  his  stomick :  he  eats  nothing  but  white 

^P'  neats,  and  not  much  of  that,  and  wheezes,  and  seems  to  be 

tiDiJi^kiuch  bloated.    The  doctor  thinks  he  is  threatened  with  a 


7 1 6  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GA ZJNE, 

dropsy.  Parson  Marrofat,  who  has  got  the  same  disorder, 
finds  great  benefit  from  the  waters;  but  Chowder  seems  to 
like  them  no  better  than  the  squire ;  and  mistress  says,  if  his 
ca^e  dont  take  a  favorable  turn,  she  will  certainly  carry  him 
to  Aberga'nny,  to  drink  of  goats'-whey."  Elsewhere  Mrs. 
Jones  is  informed  by  the  same  writer : — "  We  have  been  all  in 
a  sad  taking  here  in  Glostar.  Miss  Liddy  had  like  to  have 
run  away  with  a  player-man,  and  young  master  and  he  would 
adone  themselves  a  mischief ;  but  the  squire  applied  to  the 

mare,  and  they  were  bound  over But  what  was  worse 

than  all  this.  Chowder  has  had  the  misfortune  to  be  worried 
by  a  butcher's  dog,  and  came  home  in  a  terrible  pickle. 
Mistress  was  taken  with  the  asterisks ;  but  they  soon  went 
off.  The  doctor  was  sent  for  to  Chowder,  and  he  subscribed 
a  repository,  which  did  him  great  service.  Thank  God,  he's 
now  in  a  fairway  to  do  well."  Whenever  the  dog  appears^ — 
whether  as  sitting  gigantic  in  Jenkins's  lap  in  a  coach  and 
four ;  or  as  tearing  Matthew  Bramble's  leg  and  biting-  the 
venturesome  footman's  fingers  to  the  bone  when  the  carriage 
was  overturned  ;  or  as  the  cause  of  Matthew's  transport  of 
passion  and  sudden  ebullition  of  peremptoriness  with  Tabitha, 
which  resulted  in  Tabitha's  presentation  of  Chowder  to  Lady 
Griskin  ("who  proposes  to  bring  the  breed  of  him  into  fash- 
ion "),  and  in  his  former  mistress's  permanent  conversion 
from  chronic  spleen  to  perpetual  smiling — we  feel  that,  under 
cover  of  farce  and  satire.  Chowder  is  a  real  friend  of  Smol- 
lett's, and  his  hearty  ally  in  scourging  the  frivolities  of  the  age. 
The  humor  of  Dickens  has  sometimes  been  compared  to 
that  of  Smollett ;  and  though  there  may  be  many  points  of 
difference — perhaps  to  the  advantage  of  the  former — their  keen 
appreciation  of  a  "  funny  "  dog  is  certainly  one  point  of  union. 
and  may  be  allowed  to  serve  as  a  bridge  over  wliich  we  may 
now  pass  to  writers  of  our  own  time.  Dickens's  interest  m 
dogs,  Mr.  Forster  tells  us,  was  inexhaustible,  an3  he  wejU 
comed  with    delight    any   newly   discovered  trait    in    IlicJc 


DOGS  OF  UTERATU)ftE.  '7^7 

character.    The   society  of    his   own  dogs  he  ardently  en- 
joyed.    He  invariably  kept  two  or  more  mastiffs  to  guard 
his  house  against  the  undesirable  wayfarers  who  haunted  the 
high  road  hard  by.     Of  all  these  his  special  favorite  was  Turk, 
"a  noble  animal  full  of  affection  and  intelligence,". who  had 
as  his  co-mate  Linda,  a  "  superbly  beautiful   creature,**  the 
scion  of  a  St.  Bernard,  brought  over  by  Albert  Smith.    These 
two  dogs  happened  to  be  with  him  in  the  walk  when  he  fell 
lame,  and,  boisterous  companions,  as  they  always  were,  the 
sudden  change  in  their  master's  gait  brought  them  at  once  to 
a  standstill.    As  he  limped  home,  three   miles  through  the 
snow,  they  crept  at  his  side  at  the  same  slow  pace,  and  never 
once  turned  away  from  him.     Dickens  was  greatly  moved  at 
the  time  by  their  solicitous  behavior,  and  often  afterwards 
spoke  of  Turk's  upturned  face  as  full  of  sympathy  mingled 
with  fear,  and  of  Linda's  inconsolable'  dejection.    A  railway 
accident  brought  death  to  Turk  and  sorrow  to   his  master ; 
and  then  came  Sultan,  a  cross  between  a  St.  Bernard  and  a 
liloodhound,  built  like  a   lioness,  but  of  such   indomitably 
aggressive  propensities  that,  after  breaking  loose  and  well 
nigh  devouring  a  small  sister  of  one  of  the  servants,  he  was 
first  flogged  and  then  sentenced  to  be  ^hot  at  seven  the  next 
morning.   "  He  went  out,"  says  Dickens,  "very  cheerfully  with 
the  half-dozen  men  told  off  for  the  purpose,  evidently  thinking 
they  were  going  to  be  the  death  of  somebody  unknown.  But  ob- 
serving in  the  procession  an  empty  wheelbarrow  and  a  double- 
barreled  gun,  he  became  meditative  and  fixed  the  bearer  of  the 
g-un  with  his  ej'^es.   A  stone  deftly  thrown  across  him  by  the  vil- 
lage blackguard  (the  chief  mourner)  caused  him  to  Jook  round 
for  an  instant,  and  he  then  fell  dead,  shot  through  the  heart. 
Two  posthumous  children  are  at  this  moment  rolling  on  the 
lawn  ;  one  will  evidently  inherit  his  ferocity,  and  will  prob- 
ably inherit  the  gun.*'    The  description  of  Dickens's  welcome 
by  his  dogs  on  his  return  from  America— Jiow  they  lifted  their 
heads  to  have  their  ears  pulled,  an  attention  received  from 


7l8  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

him  alone ;  how  Linda,  weeping  profusely,  threw  herself  ou 
her  back  that  she  might  caress  his  foot  with  her  large  fore 
paws ;  and  how  the  terrier,  Mrs.  Bouncer,  b;irking  furiously, 
"tore  round  him  like  the  dog  in  the  Faust  outlines "- — ^Will 
show  at  once  the  tender  relations  that  existed  between  the 
great  novelist  and  his  canine  friends.  But  we  must  not  omit 
little  Snittle  Timbery,  a  present  from  Mitchell,  the  comedian, 
during  Dickens's  first  visit  to  America.  Timber  Doodle  was 
the  original  name  of  the  small  shaggy  white  terrier ;  but  Snit- 
tle Timber)'-  was  deemed  by  his  new  owner  to  be  more  sonor- 
ous and  expressive.  When  Dickens  and  Snittle  both  suffered 
at  Albaro,  in  Italy,  the  one  from  swarms  of  musquitoes,  the 
other  from  flees,  the  dog  came  off  worst :  there  was  no  choice 
but  to  shave  off  every  hair  of  his  body.  "  It  is  very  awful," 
writes  Dickens,  "  to  see  him  slide  into  a  room.  He  knows  the 
change  upon  him,and  is  always  turning  round  and  round  to  look 
for  himself.  I  think  he'll  die  of  grief."  Dickens's  sympathy 
with  dogs,  and  especially  with  their  humor,  might  be  further 
illustrated  by  his  story  of  the  very  comical  dog  that  caught 
his  eye  in  the  middle  of  a  reading,  and,  after  intently  looking 
at  him  for  some  time,  bounced  out  into  the  center  aisle  and 
tried  the  effect  of  a  bark  upon  the  proceedings,  when  Dick- 
ens burst  into  such  a  paroxysm  of  laughter  that  the  audience 
roared  again  and  again  with  him.  The  dog  came  the  next 
night  also  but  met  with  a  very  different  reception;  for,  having 
given  warning  of  his  presence  to  an  attendant  near  the  door 
by  a  suppressed  bark  and  a  touch  on  the  leg,  he  was  caught 
in  flagrante  delicto,  when  with  his  eye  upon  Dickens  he  was 
just  about  to  give  louder  tongue,  and  was  whirled  with  both 
hands  over  the  attendant's  head  into  the  entrance  behind, 
whence  he  was  promptly  kicked  by  the  check-takers  into  the 
street.  Next  night  he  came  again,  and  with  another  dog^ 
whom  "he  had  evidently  promised  to  pass  in  free";  but  the 
check-takers  were  prepared.  ,. 

^   To  turn  now  from  Dickens's  real  life  to  his  fiction,  the^iM 


DOGS  OF  LITER  A  TURE.  7 IQ 

ways  of  an  excitable  and  irrascible  English  terrier  are  no- 
tvhere,  I  should  say,  more  vividly  depicted  than  in  his  portrait 
of  Diogenes;  he  mast  surely  have  known  some  such  dog 
intimately.  Take  the  absurd  scene  of  the  dog's  arrival  at  the 
pombey  residence  under  the  care  of  Florence's  admirer,  Mr, 
Toots,  in  a  hackney  cab,  into  which  Diogenes  had  been  lured 
under  pretense  of  rats  in  the  straw;  and  the  description  of 
his  frantic  and  ludicrous  gestures  in  the  vehicle  while  his 
presence  was  being  formally  announced  to  Florence  in  the 
drawing-room.  Diogeaes  was  not  "a  lady's  dog,  you  know" 
(to  use  Mr.  Toot's  phrase) :  he  was  as  ridiculous  a  dog  as  one 
would  meet  in  a  day's  march — "a  blundering,  ill-favored, 
clumsy,  bullet-headed  dog,  continually  acting  on  a  wrong  idea 
that  there  was  an  enemy  in  the  neighborhood  whom  it  was 
meritorious  to  bark  at ;  far  from  good-tempered,  and  certainly 
not  clever ;  with  hair  all  over  his  eyes,  and  a  comic  nose,-and 
an  inconsistent  tail,  and  a  gruff  voice  ";  yet  he  was  dearer  to 
Florence,  because  of  Paul,  than  the  most  beautiful  of  his 
kind.  None  but  an  affectionate  observer  of  dogs  could  have 
so  graphically  described  the  manners  of  Diogenes  after  his 
release  from  the  cab :  how  he  dived  under  all  the  furniture ; 
how  he  wound  his  long  iron  chain  around  the  legs  of  the 
chairs  and  tables  at  the  risk  of  accidental  death  by  suffoca- 
cation ;  how  the  new  idea  struck  him  of  baying  Mr.  Totts  till 
he  had  effected  that  gentleman's  summary  expulsion ;  how, 
on  another  occasion,  he  viewed  Mr.  Toots  as  a  foreigner,  and 
seized  him  by  his  expensive  pantaloons  when  he  was  leaving 
one  of  the  daily  carcfs ;  how  he  would  lie  with  his  head  upon 
the  window-ledge  all  through  a  summer's  day,  placidly  open- 
ing and  shutting  his  eyes  upon  the  street,  till  some  noisy  dog 
in  a  cart  roused  his  ire,  calling  for  a  wild  rush  to  the  door, 
and  a  deafening  disturbance,  succeeded  by  the  complacent 
return  of  Diogenes  with  the  air  of  one  who  had  done  a  public 
service.  Even  Florence  Dombey  could  not  have  excelled 
Dickens  in  the  appreciation  of  Diogenes.    Jip,  Dora's  black- 


720  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and-tan  pet,  is,  at  the  first  blush,  as  unwelcome  as  Dora  ;  but 
all  through  the  acquaintance,  engagement,  and  married  life  of 
Dora  and  David  we  feel  that  Jip  is  as  much  an  individual  as 
either  of  them.  At  first,  indeed,  Dickens  uses  him  to  set  off 
Dora's  exasperating  childishness.  She  perpetually  interposes 
him  to  prevent  any  serious  talk  or  "reasoning";  so  that, 
even  when  David  presents  himself  to  her  as  a"  penniless  beg- 
gar," she  cannot  avoid  reminding  him  that  "  Jip  must  have  a 
chop  every  day  at  twelve,  or  he  will  die."  Not  less  charac- 
teristic and  annoying  is  it  whe.n  Dora  uses  the  cookery  book 
(with  which,  in  its  new  gay  binding,  David  hopes  to  interest 
and  enlighten  her  ignorance)  as  a  corner-stool  for  Jip  to  "  stand 
up"  on,  or  as  an  unresisting  prey  which  Jip  may  worry. 
But  as  time  goes  on  and  Dora  comes  to  see  her  own  un- 
fitness, and  touchingly  begs  to  be  called  the  "child-wife," 
and  tries  to  be  useful  to  her  "  Doady  "  by  at  least,  if  she  can 
do  no  more,  holding  his  pens  for  him  as  he  writes  into,  the 
late  hours  of  the  night — then  Jip  serves  to  set  off  the  pathos 
ot  her  childish  love,  till  that  affecting  scene  when  Jip  and  Dora 
leave  the  world  together ;  and  then  we  see  that  Dickens  has 
loved  Jip  after  all.  Bull's-eye,  Sykes's  dog,  in  "  Oliver  Twist," 
likewise  sets  off  his  owner's  character;  but  in  the  treatment 
of  a  character  so  dark  there  is  no  room  for  humor  save  of  the 
grimmest  order.  That  is  a  master-stroke,  however,  when  the 
Dodger,  describing  BulPs-eye  as  the  "  downiest  of  the  lot " 
in  Fagin's  establishment,  adds :  "  He  would  not  so  tnuch  as 
bark  in  a  witness-box  for  fear  of  committing  himself;  no,  not 
if  you  tied  him  up  in  one  and  left  him  there  without  wittles 
for  a  fortnight."  Bull's-eye  is  a  miracle  of  immovable  canine 
faithfulness.  This  white  dog,  first  introduced  to  us  as  k^ 
skulked  into  Sykes's  room  with  his  face  scratched  and  ton 
in  twenty  different  places,  should  have^had  as  his  badge  tii0 
"  badge  of  sufferance.'*  Growls,  curses,  kicks,  flying  pew^li^  j 
and  other  visitations  of  Sykes's  savagery  whenever  it  loo|U|A-  j 
round  for  a  butt,  never  provoked  reprisal,  broke  his 


JPOGS  OF  LITERATURE.  721 

stunted  his  devotion ;  even  when  he  was  so  cruelly  assaulted 
with  poker  and  clasp-knife,  the  anger  of  his  snapping  and  bark- 
ing, which  preceded  his  flight  by  the  opening  door,  meant  no 
harm  to  his  master,  but  was  only  the  safety-valve  which  at 
other  times  let  off  the  steam  by  crushing  through  an  occupied 
boot  or  biting  like  a  wild  beast  at  the  end  of  a  poker.  In 
spite  of  all  that  he  endured,  one  word  or  even  a  look  from 
Sykes,  and  he  was  "  ready,  aye,  ready  "  to  serve  him.  When, 
after  the  murder  of  Nancy,  Sykes  sought  to  put  one  risk  out 
of  the  way  by  drowning  him,  Bull's-eye  showed  no  malice — 
he  only  slunk  reproachfully  away ;  and  the  pathetic  and  fatal 
endeavor  of  the  returned  and  forgiving  dog  to  leap  from  the 
parapet  to  the  shoulders  of  his  hanging  master, — so  that, 
however  unpleasant  to  Bull's-eye  had  been  their  lives,  in 
death  they  were  not  divided, — is  the  cro\tn  and  consummation 
oi  the  dog's  unwavering  and  unrewarded  loyalty. 

It  would  be  like  an  amputation  to  regard  Lytton's  "  What 
will  he  do  with  it  ?  "  apart  from  Sir  Isaac,  the  accomplished 
French  poodle  which  "Gentleman  Waife,"  after  a  long  period 
of  unfulfilled  desire,  was  at  last  enabled  to  purchase  with 
the  three  pounds  obtained  by  his  supposed  grand-daughter, 
Sophie,  for  a  sitting  to  Vance  the  painter.  The  original  name, 
Mop,  had  been  instantly  discarded  by  Waife  as  too  trivial ; 
and  the  various  experiments  to  discover  what  more  appro- 
priate title  would  be  agreeable  to  Mop,  and  the  successive 
failures  betokened  by  successive  lugubrious  howls,  till  Isaac, 
the  name  of  his  first  master,  was  unwittingly  hit  upon,  with 
the  expletive  Sir  prefixed,  because  Waife  had  intended  to 
draw  upon  the  name  of  an  equally  intelligent  calculator — form 
one  of  the  best  scenes  in  the  book.  To  the  name  Newton 
alone  Mop  declined  to  respond,  but  Isaac  was  a  joyful  memory 
to  him ;  and  for  the  sake  of  the  Isaac  he  let  the  Sir  pass.  Sir 
Isaac  and  Waife  are  one  throughout  the  story :  the  fortunes 
of  the  one  rise  and  fall  with  those  of  the  other ;  and,  when 
"Gentleman  Waife"  is  restored  to  his  true  position  at  last* 
Sir  Isaac  is  "  there  to  see.'* 


\ 

722  THE  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZWE. 

Washington  Irving  has  left  us  a  possession,  perhaps  fot 
ever,  in  Rip  van  Winkle  and  his  dog  Wolf,  a  possession  in- 
creased in  value  by  the  impersonation  of  Mr.  Jefferson,  with 
his  pathetic,  half-humorous,  half-despairing  inquiry,  "  Did  you 
know  Schneider?  'Cos  he  was  my  dog."  This  Wolf  (or 
Schneider)  "  was  as  much  henpecked  as  his  master ;  for  Dame 
van  Winkle  regarded  them  as  companions  in  idleness,  and 
even  looked  upon  Wolf  with  an  evil  eye,  as  the  cause  of  his 
master's  going  so  often  astray.  True  it  is,  in  all  points  of 
spirit  befitting  an  honorable  dog  he  was  as  courageous  an 
animal  as  ever  scoured  the  woods;  but  what  courage  can 
withstand  the  ever-enduring,  all  besetting  terrors  of  a  wcmian's 
tongue  ?  The  moment  Wolf  entered  the  house  his  crest  fell, 
his  tail  drooped  to  the  ground  or  curled  between  his  leg-s ;  he 
sneaked  about  with  a  gallows  air,  casting  many  a  sidelong 
glance  at  Dame  van  Winkle ;  and,  at  the  least  flourish  of  a 
broomstick  or  ladle,  he  would  fly  to  the  door  with  yelping 
precipitation."  The  pity  which  Rip  and  Wolf  felt  for  the 
"  dog's  life  "  led  by  both — ^the  vow  of  friendship  whicli  with 
mutual  expressiveness  they  swore — ^the  climax  of  loneliness 
that  burst  upon  the  exile,  returning  after  his  twenty  years' 
absence,  when  a  half-starved  cur,  prowling  near  Rip's  roofless 
dwelling,  snarled,  showed  his  teeth,  and  passed  on,  wringing 
from  him  the  cry  "  My  very  dog  has  forgotten  me ! " — ^are  all 
graphic  touches  which  reveal  to  us  that  Wolf  had  another 
friend  besides  Rip,  and  that  was  Washington  Irving. 

Tartar,  in  "  Shirley,"  is  the  Keeper  that  occupies  so  promi- 
nent a  position  in  the  life  at  Haworth  Parsonage,  and  is  Char- 
lotte Bronte's  tribute  to  her  dead  sister  Emily's  favorite,  as 
"  Shirley  "  is  to  Emily,  herself ;  and  all  the  scenes  in  which 
they  figure  are  taken  from  real  life.  This  huge  animal,  half 
mastiff,  half  bull-dog,  was  faithful  to  the  depths  of  his  na^it|BW 
Mr.  Gaskell  tells  us,  so  long  as  he  was  with  friends,  but^ 
struck  him  with  a  stick  or  a  whip  roused  the  relentless  nl 
of  the  brute  in  him,  and  brought  him  to  his  .assailvit's  tlir3 


I>OGS  OF  -LITERATURE-'  723 

forthwith,  where  he  held  fast  till  one  or  other  was  at  the  point  of 
death.  This  trait  in  Tartar's  character  gives  scope  to  a  most 
ludicrous  scene  in  "Shirley, "'In  course  of  which  Mr.  Malone 
and  Mr.  Dorine  seek  ignominious  refuge  in  various  illegal, 
though  fortunately  unoccupied,  rooms,  while  JShirley,  coming 
to  the  rescue,  "exhibits  that  provoking  coolness  which  the 

-  owners  of  formidable-looking  dogs  are  apt  to  show  when 
their  animals  are  all  bustle  and  fury,"  begging  Mr.  Malone,  as 
he  re-appears  over  the  banister,  to  release  his  friend  Mr. 
Donne  and  inform  him  that  she  prefers  to  receive  him  in  a 
lower  room.  Emily  Bronte's  fearless  bravery  cannot  be  more 
vividly  realized  than  from  the  account  Mr.  Gaskell  gives,  how, 
in  fulfillment  of  a  resolution  taken  in  spite  of  all  warning  and 
a  full  knowledge  of  Keeper's  ferocity,  she  dragged  him  from 
his  favorite  and  forbidden  place  of  voluptuous  repose — a  deli- 
cate white  counterpane — and  jnet  his  spring  at  the  foot  of  the 
dark  staircase  with  her  clenched  fist,  till  "  his  eyes  were 
swelled  up,  and  the  half-blind,  half-stupefied  beast  was  led  to 

-  his  accustomed  lair,  to  have  his  swollen  head  fomented  and 
cared  for  by  Emily  herself."  Yet  Keeper  owed  her  no  grudge, 
In  "  Shirley"  we  see  the  "  tawny  lionlike  bulk  of  Tartar  ever 
stretched  beside  his  mistress,  one  of  her  hands  generally 
resting  on  the  loving  serfs  rude  head,  because  if  she  took  it 
away  he  groaned  and  was  discontented."  Keeper  walked  side 
by  side  with  old  Mr.  Bronte  at  Emily's  funeral ;  and  there- 
after, to  the  day  of  his  death,  slept  at  her  room  door,  snuffling 
under  it,  and  whining  every  morning,  till  he  in  his  turn  was 
mourned  over  by  "  Currer  Bell." 

Mary  Russell  Mitford  approaches  Scott  in  the  number  and 
unbroken  succession  of  her  dogs,  but  not,  as  a  rule,  in  their 
individuality  or  in  the  attractiveness  of  their  history.  In 
writing  of  her  canine  companions  she  is  rather  pleasant  than 
striking,  and  is  not  altogether  free  from  the  gushing  and  the 
commonplace.  But  her  devotion  to  them  is  undeniable:  she 
jiever  failed  to  make  some  dog  or  dogs  (almost  always  of  the 


7^4  ^^-^  LIBRA R  Y  MA GAZINE,  - 

greyhound  type)  an  integral  element  of  her  life,  and  there  is 
scarcely  a  letter  of  hers  in  which  she  does  not  refer  to  them. 
Perhaps  the  most  distinctive  •  are — ^Toney,  the  little  j^rey- 
hound  that  in  the  absence  of  his  mistress,  then  aged  thirteen, 
had  a  finger,  or  rather  a  paw,  in  laying  the  foundation-stone 
of  Bertram  House ;  Marmion,  whose  death  is  the  subject  of  a 
farewell  poem ;  Tray,  who  was  stolen  from  her,  and  after 
whom  she  dispatches  verses  of  anxious  inquiry,  and  of  ex- 
hortation to  "  Revolt,  resist,  rebel !  '* ;  Mayflower,  a  beautiful 
and  symmetrical  greyhound,  with  "the  hue  of  may-blossom, 
like  marble  with  the  sun  on  it "  ;  Dash,  a  stray  dog  originally, 
of  whom  we  are  told  in  "  Our  Village  "  that,  in  spite  of  his 
ugliness,  he  was  taken  up  and  forced  upon  the  family  by  May- 
flower, and  that  his  head  revealed  to  Dr.  Dowton,  the  phren* 
ologist,  greater  combativeness  than  he  had  ever  found  in  any 
other  spaniel — his  victory  in  twenty  pitched  battles  (includ- 
ing contests  with  two  bulldogs,  a  Dane,  and  a  Newfoundland) 
acquiring  him  the  undisputed  kingdom  of  the  street,  and  jus- 
tifying Dr.  Dowton's  reading  of  his  characteristics ;  and  lastly. 
Flush,  a  pretty  little  brown  spaniel,  first  of  all  a  servant's  prop- 
erty, whose  broken  leg  led  on  Miss  Mitford  through  the  suc- 
cessive stages  of  pity,  nursing,  and  love,  and  who  in  the  end 
took  a  place  in  the  hearts  of  the  household  never  afterwards 
filled  by  any  canine  successor. 

Mrs.  Barrett  Browning's  Flush  was  a  puppy  son  of  the  elder 
Flush,  and  was  bestowed  by  Miss  Mitford  on  his  mistress.  In 
the  footnote  to  Mrs.  Browning's  poem  on  this  her  faithful 
friend,  she  tells  us  that  Flush  belonged  to  a  beautiful  race  of 
dogs  rendered  famous  by  Miss  Mitford  in  England  and 
America.  "The  Flushes,"  she  adds,  "have  their  laurels  as 
well  as  the  Caesars — the  chief  difference  (at  least  the  very  head 
and  front  of  it)  consisting,  perhaps,  in  the  bald  head  of  the 
latter  under  the  crown."  The  verses  of  Flush's  mistress  give 
us  a  perfect  word  picture  of  what  Flush  must  have  been,  w^ 
his  "startling  eyes  of  hazel  bland,"  his  "silken  ears**  «fld 
''silver-suited  breast,"  his  body  "darkly  browp/*       ■..*-.. 


DOGS  OE  LITERA  TURK,  7^S 

Till  the  stmshlne,  striking  thU, 

Alchemise  its  dullncbs, 
When  the  sleek  curb  manifold 
Flash  all  over  into  gold 

With  a  burnished  fulness. 

But  Flush  had  better  service  to  fulfill  than  the  mere  pleas- 
ing of  the  eye  : — 

Other  dogs  may  be  thy  peers 

Haply  in  those  drooping  ears 

Ana  this  glossy  fairness. 

But  of  thee  it  shall  be  said. 
This  dog  watched  beside  a  bed 

Day  amd  night  uaweary ; 
Watched  within  a  curtained  room, 
Where  no  sunbeam  brake  the  gloom 

Round  the  sick  and  dreary. 

Other  dogs  in  thymy  dew 

Tracked  the  hare,  and  followed  through 

Sunny  moor  or  meadow ; 
This  dog  only  crept  and  crept 

Next  a  languid  cheek  that  slept, 
Sharing  in  the  shadow. 

And  this  dog  was  satisfied 

If  a  pale  thin  hand  would  glide 

Down  his  dew-laps  sloping, — 
Which  he  pushed  his  nose  within, 
Alter  platforming  his  chin 

On  the  palm  left  open. 

Flush,  Mr.  Browning  tells  me,  "  lies  in  the  vaults  under 
Casa  Guidi,  dying  as  he  did  at  Florence  in  extreme  old  age." 
Of  such  a  dog,  the  subject  of  such  a  poem,  we  may  confidently 
say,  "  His  body  is  buried  in  peace,  but  his  fame  shall  live  for 
evermore," 

The  picture  of  Charles  Kingsley  at  home  would  show  a 
serious  gap  if  his  dogs  were  not  in  the  foreground.  His  love 
for  them,  and  for  animals  generally,  was  strengthened,  it  ap- 
peals, by  his  belief  in  their  future  state,  a  belief  he  shared 
with  John  Wesley  and  other  historical  names.  Kingsley  had 
a  wonderful  power  of  attracting  the  affection  of  dumb  crea- 
tures, and  likewise  of  quelling  their  fury.  He  was  known  to 
|iave  more  than  once  driven  large  savage  dogs,  quite  strange 
to  him^  back  into  their  kennel  by  nothing  beyond  eye,  voice 


726  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

and  gesture,  cowing  them  still  with  his  look  as,  they  growled 
and  moved  uneasily  from  side  to  side ;  and  on  one  occasion, 
after  having  thus  forced  an  infuriated  brute  to  retreat  into 
his  lair,  he  even  pulled  him  out  again  by  his  chain.  Muzzie 
>Vas  his  dog  at  Magdalen,  a  clever,  sedate-looking  gray  Scotch 
terrier:  Kingsley  was  devoted  to  him.  We  hear  of  Dandie, 
Sweep,  and  Victor  at  the  Eversley  Rectory.  Mr.  John  Mar- 
tineau,  who  spent  eighteen  months  at  Eversley  as  Kingsley's 
pupil,  thus  concludes  his  description  of  the  study : — "  On  the 
mat  perhaps,  with  brown  eyes  set  in  thick  yellow  hair,  and 
with  gently  agitated  tail,  asking  indulgence  for  tlie  intrusion 
— a  long-bodied,  short-legged  Dandie  Dinmont,  wisest,  hand- 
somest, most-faithful,  most  memorable  of  his  race.'*  How 
well  established  was  the  position  of  Dandie  in  the  King^sley 
household  may  be  gathered  from  the  reminiscence  of  an 
American  visitor : — "  Still  I  see  Dandie  lying  lazy,  smiling-  anS 
winking  in  the  sun."  He  was  Kingsley's  companion  \tv  his 
parish  walks,  attended  all  the  cottage  lectures  and  school  les- 
sons, and  was  his  and  his  children's  friend  for  thirteen  years. 
Victor,  a  favorite  Teckel,  given  him  by  the  Queen,  had 
Kingsley  for  ah  unsleeping  nurse  during  the  last  two  suffer- 
ing nights  of  the  little  creature's  existence.  Sweep,  a  mag- 
nificent black  retriever,  finds  a  niche  instinctively  in  the  sur- 
roundings which  young  Mr.  Kingsley  recalls  after  his  father's 
death  : — "  I  can  see  him  now,  on  one  of  those  many  summer 
evenings,  as  he  strode  out  of  the  back  garden-gate  with  a 
sorrowful  "  no,  go  home,  Sweep  "  to  the  retriever  that  had  fol- 
lowed us  stealthily  down  the  garden  walk,  and  wlio  now' stood 
with  an  ear  cocked  and  one  paw  up,  hoping  against  hope  that 
he  might  be  allowed  to  come  on."  And  there  lie  the  dc^;^ 
buried  side  by  side  under  the  great  fir-trees  on  the  rectory* 
laWn — Dandie,  Sweep,  and  Victor— with  the  brief  but  telling 
inscription  on  the  head-stone,  "  Fideli  Fideles.'*  i 

Thus  have  I  endeavored  to  renew  the  acquaintance  of  my     J 
readers  and  myself  with  dogs  that  have  shared  the  faoae  of     I 


J)OGS  OF. LITERATURE.  72/ 

their  literary  friends;  in  some  cases  I  may  venture  to  hope  I 
"  have  perhaps  aided  in  swelling  the  number  of  the  friendships 
these  dogs  have  hitherto  been  able  to  claim.     For  in  a  sense, 
they  are  all  ours — Maida,  Luath,  Boatswain,  Diogenes — even 
as  those  are  ours  whose  possessions  or  creations  they  were. 
But  it  goes  to  my  heart  that  so  many  dogs  of  worth  are  per- 
force passed  over  in  my  chronicle.    Time  and  space  would 
fail  me  to  tell  of  Skovmark,  the  comrade  of  Sintram  in  his 
wild  wanderings — of  the  dog  that  for  sixteen  years  soothed 
the  solitude  of  Robinson  Crusoe — of  Bras,  the  Princess  of 
Thule's  deerhound,  the  only  reminder  in  unkindly  London  of 
Sheila's  Highland  home — of  George  Eliot's   Mumps  in  the 
"  Mill  on  the  Floss  " — of  Faust  in  *'  Lewis  Arundel " — of  Bustle 
in  the  "Heir  of  Redclyffe"— of  Snarleyyow  in  Captain  Mar- 
ryatt's  "  Dog  Fiend  " — of  Royal  in  "  Blair  Castle,"  a  book  which 
Mr.  Ruskin  has  summarized  as  "  the  best  picture  of  a  perfect 
child  and  of  the  next  best  thing  in  creation,  a  perfect  dog;'' 
over  whose  cruel  death  I  have  known  listening  children  shed 
floods  of  tears — of  Isla,  Puck,  the  dog  of  Flanders,  and  the 
many  dogs,  real  and  fictitious,  associated  with  the  name  of 
Ouida — of  the  Druid  of  "  Barbara's  History,"  the  Vic  of  Rhoda 
Broughton's  "  Nancy,"  the  Huz  and  Buz  of  Mr.  Bouncer  in 
"  Verdant  Green,"  of  Punch's  immemorial  Toby,  and  that  cher- 
ished childish  memory  the  *  poor  dog '  of  Mother  Hubbard — 
of  the  "  Matthew  Arnold  "  that  intensifies  the  comicality  of  the 
"  Old  Maid's  Paradise  " — of  Cartouche,  the  title  and  the  hero 
of  as  charming  and  pathetic  a  dog  story,  "  Cartouche,  or  only 
a  Dog,"  as  I  have  ever  read ;  a  dog  alike  of  humor,  of  tender- 
ness, and  of  courage  •.  ludicrous,  as  he  dashes  -suddenly  into 
the  thick  of  a  "  proposal  " ;  gentle,  as  he  watches  at  the  bed  of 
his  dying  mistress ;  brave,  as  he  rescues  a  cottager's  cradled 
child  from  the  flooded  Tiber ;  self-forgetful,  as  he  turns  back 
to   save   his   struggling  master's  Hfe,  and  to  lose   his   own. 
"  And  a  peasant  woman,  so  ends  the  tale,  in  a  southern  coun- 
try, has  taught  her  children  to  love  animals  and  be  good  to 


728  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

them ;  for  one  of  them  was  saved  by  a  dog.  The  children 
listen,  thrilled  by  the  familiar  story.  '  Eccolo  ! '  cries  a  little 
girl,  pointing;  and  they  all  turn  to  look  up  where,  over  the 
door,  is  a  carved  figure  of  a  dog  with  a  date."  And  no  article 
on  the  dogs  of  literature  would  in  this  generation  be  complete 
without  some  passing  reference,  at  least,  to  "  Rab  and  his 
Friends."  "  Horae  Subsecivae  *'  with  its  Rab,  Toby,  and  their 
compeers,  is  however  so  well  known  that  Dr.  John  Brown's 
perfect  story,  which  has  so  often  been  read  with  laughter  and 
with  tears,  needs  no  fresh  telling.  "  Lives  there  a  man  with 
soul  so  dead,"  who  having, once  made  Rab  his  own,  is  content 
not  to  know  and  to  love  him  more  and  more  }  As  for  all  to 
whom  Rab  is  as  yet  undiscovered,  let  them  search  for  him  as 
for  hid  treasure. 

Dogs  of  myth  and  of  legend — dogs  of  history,  such  as  the 
dog  of  William  the  Silent — dogs  of  art,  such  as  Hogarth's 
Pompey  and  Crab,  the  dogs  of  Landseer  and  Ansdell,  or  the 
Chang  with  whom  Du  Maurier  has  made  us  so  familiar — ^and 
all  those  dogs  whose  mere  instinct,  intelligence,  or  courage 
has  constituted  them  the  heroes  of  so  many  books  and  anec- 
dotes— ^would  be  altogether  beyond  the  scope  of  the  present 
article.  My  aim  has  been  to  re-awake  the  associations,  not  of 
dog  and  hero,  dog  and  gun,  dog  and  horse,  or  dog  and  dog 
lover  generally,  but  of  dog  and  pen ;  and  to  put  on  record 
how  widespread,  in  the  range  of  English  literature  at  any  rate, 
has  been  the  friendship  of  the  writer  and  his  dog.  ^ 

From  Temple  Bar. 

THE  BRITISH  CENSUS  OF  1881. 

The  Census  of  1881  has  been  taken^  and  the  result  of  the 
labors  of  the  Registrar-General  and  his  vast  army  of  enumera- 
tors has  been  embodied  in  a  preliminary  report,  which  has      i 
been  presented  to  Parliament.  '  I 

^9^    I 


The  census,  as  taken  nowadays,  is  a  very  elabons^t^  WA\ ' 


•-  "Si**  J 


THE  BRITISH  CENSUS  OF  laSi.  729* 

far  as  human  ingenuity  and  patience  can  make  it,  a  very- 
accurate  numbering  of  the  people.  The-  Doomsday  Book  of 
William  the  Conqueror  was  perhaps  the  first  crude  attempt  in 
these  islands  of  keeping  a  record  of  the  numbers  and  condi- 
tions of  their  inlhabitants,  and,  at  best,  it  was  but  an  imperfect' 
undertaking.  It  was  not  until  the  year  1753  that  a  formal  pro- 
posal to  take  a  census  was  made  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
and  it  was  then  opposed  as  ^  project  which  had  for  its  object 
the  violation  of  an  Englishman's  rights  and  liberty.  It  was 
considered  by  many  that  the  knowledge  thus  obtained  would 
lead  to  acts  of  oppression,  such  as  compulsory  service  in  the 
army  and  navy,  the  exaction  of  unjust  taxes,  and  many  other 
things  of  a  like  arbitrary  nature  ;  and  one  minister  was  actu- 
ally indiscreet  enough  to  hint  that  the  census  would  be  used 
for  conscription  purposes  in  the  case  of  a  long  war.  The- bill 
passed  the  House  of  Commons  by  large  majorities,  but  was 
injected  by  the  House  of  Lords.  Fifty  years  later  there  came 
a  scare  of  another  kind,  in  consequence  of  many  people 
thinking  that  the  population  was  increasing  beyond  the  means 
of  subsistence,  and  a  bill  was  passed  in  1801  for  the  taking  of 
a  census ;  which  was  duly  effected. 

The  census  of  1881,  which  is  the  ninth  decennial  enumera- 
tion of  the  population  of  the  United  Kingdom,  was  taken  on 
4th  of  April  last ;  and  so  vast  are  the  figures  involved  in  this 
great  national  roll-call,  that,  even  with  the  assistance  of  a 
large  staff  of  clerks,  it  took  the  Registrar-General  three 
months  to  ascertain  the  result.  The  report  embodying  the 
result,  and  from  the  pages  of  which  we  derive  our  statistics, 
is  only  a  preliminary  one,  dealing  with  the  actual  numbers  of 
the  people.  In  addition  to  the  work  of  abstracting  the  totals 
from  the  enumeration  books  and  arranging  the  tables  for  pub- 
lication, the  whole  of  the  superintendent-registrars',  regis- 
trars*, and  enumerators'  claims  had  to  be  examined  and 
checked,  and  the  payments  made ;  and  when  we  mention  that 
there  were  six  hundred  and  thirty  superintendent-registrars 


730  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

of  districts,  about  two  thousand  seven  hundred  registrars  of 
sub-districts,  besides  thirty-five  thousand  enilmerators,  our 
readers  will  scarcely  be  surprised  to  learn  that  the  time  ab- 
sorbed in  this  work  alone  was  six  weeks.  The  sum  of  money 
paid  away  for  this  part  of  the  census  was  over  eighty  thous- 
and pounds. 

This  portion  of  the  work  was  performed  by  the  Accounts* 
Branch  of  the  Registrar-Greneral's  Department,  with  such 
accuracy  of  detail,  that  not  a  single  mistake  of  any  magnitude 
occurred  in  the  payments  in  question.  For  the  taking  of  the 
census  Parliament  last  year  voted  the  sum  of  one  hundred 
and  thirty-five  thousand  pounds.  And  by  way  of  comparison 
it  may  be  interesting  to  note  here  that  the  cost  of  the  Amer- 
ican census  is  seven  hundred  thousand  pounds.   , 

TJie  grand  total  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  United  Kingdom 
living  at  midnight  on  the  3d  of  April  last,  including  the  army 
and  navy  and  the  Channel  Islands,  was  thirty-five  millions  two 
hundred  and  forty-six  thousand  five  hundred  and  sixty-two ; 
the  preponderance  of  females  over  males  being  no  less  than 
seven  hundred  and  thirty-eight  thousand  six  hundred  and 
sixty-eight.  The  corresponding  total  for  the  whole  kingdom 
in  1 87 1  was  thirty-one  millions  eight  hundred  and  forty-five 
thousand  three  hundred  and  seventy-nine :  which,  when  sub- 
tracted from  the  other — ^allowing,  of  course,  for  the  decrease 
in  Ireland  and  in  the  Channel  Islands,  and  the  Isle  of  Man 
— shows  an  increase  of  three  millions  four  hundred  and  one 
thousand  one  hundred  and  eighty-three.  This  is  equivalent 
to  an  average  daily  addition  of  nine  hundred  and  thirt3r-ooe 
persons  to  the  population  throughout  the  ten  years  {  the 
daily  increase  in  the  preceding  decade  having  been  seven  hu|i- 
dred  and  five. 

The  population  of  England  and  Wales  on  the  night  of  Aplil 
3d  was  twenty-five  millions  nine  hundred  and  sixty-Qig|lt 
thousand  two  hundred  and  eighty-six;  being  an  increa$|| fit 
three  millions  two  hundred  and  fifty-six  thousand  and.|w<l 


THE  BHITISff  CENSUS  OF  f^%i.  Jil 

oVer  the  number  of  1871 ;  and  showing  further  an  excess  of 
females  over  males  of  seven  hundred  and  eighteen  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  seventy-eight.  To  each  one  hundred  males 
enumerated  there  were  thus  105.7  females ;  and  the  proportion 
of  females  to  males  has,  it  appears,  been  steadily  increasing  at 
each  census  since  1851.  England  alone  has  a  population  of 
tweixty-four  millions  six  hundred  and  eight  thousand  three 
hundred  and  ninety-one ;  exhibiting  an  increase  of  three  milr 
lions  three  hundred  and  thirteen  thousand  two  hundred  and 
sixty  over  the  figures  of  187 1. 

By  manipulation  of  these  figures,  we  find  that  the  density  of 
thp  population  of  England  and  Wales  is  now  about  four  hun- 
dred and  forty  persons  to  the  square  mile,  or  nearly  six  times 
as  many  as  in  the  days  of  "  Good  Queen  Bess.*'  In  1871  there 
were  390  persons  to  the  square  mile  in  England  and  Wales ; 
so  that  there  is  an  increase  of  fifty  to  this  small  area  in  the 
past  ten  years.  There  is,  however,  plenty  of  breathing-room 
left  yet  to  each  inhabitant ;  for  it  is  calculated  that  an  area  of 
six  thousand  nine  hundred  and  fifty-five  square  yards  could 
1)6  allotted  to  each  person  in^ England  and  Wales. 

The  great  improvements  in  sanitary  science  during  the  past 
decade  are  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  annual  death-rate  has 
decreased  to  such  an  extent,  that  no  less  than  two  hundred 
and  ninety-nine  thousand  three  hundred  and  eighty-five  per- 
sons are  now  living,  who,  with  the  previous  rate  of  mortality, 
would  have  died. 

Scotland  contributes  to  the  grand  total  three  millions  seven 
hundred  and  thirty-four  thousand  three  hundred  and  seventy, 
or  nearly  one  hundred  thousand  less  than  the  population  of 
London  !  Therens  an  increase  for  Scotland  over  the  census  of 
1871  of  three  hundred  and  seventy-four  thousand  three  hund- 
red and  fifty-two.  This  is,  however,  not  the  case  with  the  sister 
isle ;  for  Ireland  exhibits  a  decrease  of  two  hundred  and  fifty- 
two  thousand  five  hundred  and  thirty-eight ;  the  present  total 
being  five  mtllions  one  hundred  and  fifty-nine  thousand  eight 
hundred  and  thirty-nine. 


732  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

The  population  of  the  Isle  of  Man  is  fifty-three  thousand 
four  hundred  and  ninety-two ;  being  a  decrease  of  five  hun- 
dred and  fifty  under  the  figures  of  1871 ;  and  the  Channel  Isl- 
ands eighty-seven  thousand  seven  hundred  and  thirty-one, 
with  a  decrease  of  two  thousand  eight  hundred  and  sixty-five. 

The  army,  navy,  and  merchant  service- give  an  aggregate 
return  of  two  hundred  and  forty-two  thousand  eight  hundred 
and  forty-four;  being  an  increase  of  twenty-six  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  sixty-four. 

Eight  English  counties  have  fallen  off  in  their  numbers 
since  1871 — Cornwall  showing  the  large  decrease  of  thirty- 
two  thousand  eight  hundred  and  fifty-nine!  Cambridge,  Rut- 
•  land,  and  Westmoreland  have  also  decreased  to  the  extent  of 
over  one  thousand  each  ;  and  Dorset,  Hereford,  and  Hunting- 
don by  over  tour  thousand.  Shropshire  has  been  nearly 
stationary,  with  a  slight  decrease  of  one  hundred  and  eighteen. 

Lancashire  stands  first  on  the  list  of  the  counties  whose 
numbers  have  increased,  with  a  difference  in  her  favor  of  six 
hundred  and  thirty-four  thousand  seven  hundred  and  thirty. 
Yorkshire  comes  next,  with  an  yicrease  of  four  hundred  and 
forty-nine  thousand  nine  hundred  and  fifty-four;  Middlesex 
next,  with  a  difference  of  three  hundred  and  seventy-nine 
thousand  and  forty-nine ;  and  Surrey  with  three  hundred  and 
forty-four  thousand  two  hundred  and  seven.  Five  other 
counties— Durham,  Essex,  Kent,  Stafford,  and  Warwick — 
exhibit  an  additional  force  of  over  one  hundred  thousand ; 
while  Buckingham,  Devon,  Norfolk,  Oxford,  Somerset,  Suf- 
folk, and  Wilts  have  an  increase  in  each  case  of  less  than  ten 
thousand — ^the  first-named  being  only  about  four  hundred. 

Wales  shows  a  total  population  of  one  mtilt6n  three  hundred 
and  fifty-nine  thousand  eight  hundred  and  ninety-five,of  which. 
like  England,  the  majority  are  of  the  fair  sex.  Of  the  Wel^ 
counties,  six  show  an  aggregate  increase  of  one  hundred  tfrf 
iifty-two  thousand  one  hundred  and  twenty-three.  These  wspj 
Carmarthen,  Carnarvon,  Denbigh,  Flint,  Glamorgan,  zsA  i 


THE  BRITISH  CENSUS.  OF  i88i.  733 

ioneth  ;  the  last-named  but  one  taking  the  hon's  share,  namely- 
one  hundred  and  thirteen  thousand  eight  hundred  and  thir- 
teen. The  other  six  counties  show  an  aggregate  decline  of 
nine  thousand  three  hundred  and  sixty-three. 

Wherever  we  find  the  county  areas  densely  populated,  it  may 
be  taken  for  granted  that  the  industries  connected  therewith 
are  in  a  thriving  state  ;  while  those  counties  which  fall  below 
a  certain  maximum  have  generally  either  small  manufacturing 
agencies  in  operation,  or  are  for  the  most  part,  if  not  entirely, 
agricultural.  For  instance,  we  may  take  it  that  a  density  of 
two  hundred  to  the  square  mile  would  be  fair  evidence  of  the 
presence  in  such  counties  of  large  manufactures  or  mines; 
whilst  a  scarcity  of  population  would  denote  the  absence  of 
such  works.  Lancashire  and  Middlesex  show  a  density 
respectively  of  one  thousand  seven  hundred,  and  one  thous- 
and three  hundred,  to  the  square  mile,  these  counties  being 
those  in  which  the  greatest  industrial  activity  is  developed ; 
while  six  other  counties  exhibit  a  density  of  over  five  hun- 
dred to  the  same  limited  area. 

,  Amidst  all  these  totals,  however,  the  most  remarkable  is 
that  of  London,  which  now  stands  at  the  astounding  figure 
of  three  millions  eight  hundred  and  fourteen  thousand  five 
hundred  and  seventy-one ;  thus  heading  the  other  towns  in 
the  kingdom  with  the  enormous  increase  of  five  hundred  and 
sixty  thousand  three  hundred  and  eleven ;  which  in  itself  is 
'  more  than  the  population  of  Liverpool,  and  is  equal  to  the 
aggregate  increase  in  thirteen  of  the  largest  towns  in  England 
during  the  same  period.  Of  this  immense  total  of  nearly  four 
millions  of  human  souls^  the  fair  sex  predominates  to  the 
extent  of  two  hundred  and  twenty-six  thousand  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty-nine ;  there  being  thus  in  the  Great  Metropolis 
nearly  a  quarter  of  a  million  more  women  than  men.  The 
population  of  London  exceeds  that  of  Scotland  by  eighty 
the  jsand  two  hundred  and  one.  Its  increase  alone  is  a  little 
less  than  the  whole  population  of  Hampshire,  and  about  the 


-  734  THE  LI  BRA  R  V  MA  GAZINE. 

same  as  of  extra-Metropolitan  Middlesex  and  Hertfordshire 
taken  together,  more  than  half  as  much  as  Staffordshire,  and 
iour  times  as  much  as  Herefordshire  and  Radnorshire  com- 
bined. 

The  necessity  of  having  public  parks  and  open  spaces  in 
London  for  the  benefit  of  the  health  of  its  inhabitants,  is 
clearly  shown  by  the  astonishing  fact,  that  there  are  no  fewer 
than  thirty-two  thousand  three  hundred  and  twenty-six 
persons  to  the  square  mile,  or  about  fifty  to  the  statute  acre ; 
the  three  portions  of  the  Metropolis  situated  in  Middlesex, 
Surrey,  and  Kent  having  respectively  eighty,  forty-four,  and 
thirteen  to  the  acre. 

The  City  of  London,  according  to  what,  for  the  sake  of 
comparison  only,  we  will  term  the  Imperial  Census,  contained 
on  the  night  of  Sunday,  April  3d,  fifty  thousand  five  hundred 
and  twenty-six  souls ;  but,  dissatisfied  with  this  manner  of 
reckoning  the  inhabitants  of  the  world's  mart,  the  Corporation 
determined  upon  having  a  Day  Census  taken  ;  and  this  was 
actually  done  about  three  weeks  after  the  government  enu- 
meration. The  result,  which  took  the  city  officers  three  months 
to  arrive  at,  shows  that  the  commercial  and  mercantile  popula- 
tion of  the  city  on  the  day  in  question  was  two  hundred  and 
sixty  thousand  six  hundred  and  seventy.  This  is  an  increase 
over  the  total  of  1866,  when  a  Day  Census  was  also  taken,  of 
forty  thousand  and  eleven.  The  Imperial  Census  shows  the 
resident  population  of  the  city  to  have  decreased  by  twenty- 
four  thousand  six  hundred  and  seventy-seven.  This  is,  of 
course,  accounted  for  by  its  merchants  and  others  now  pre- 
ferring suburban  residences  to  those  situated  among  factories 
and  warehouses. 

The  metropolis  is  divided  into  twenty-nine  districts ;  and 
of  these,  Islington,  Kensington,  Lambeth,  and  Pancras  stood 
highest  as  regards  numbers  in  187 1 ;  and  now  exhibit  an  in- 
crease of  thirty-two,  twenty-four,  seventeen,  and  seven  pey 
cent  respectively,  each  having,  more  or  lesS/  a  population  of 


THE  BRITISH  CENSUS  OF  1881.  735 

about  a  quarter  of  a  million.  Eight  mfitropolitan  districts 
show  a  decrease  during  the  past  ten  years;  while  Fulham, 
which  was  not  regarded  as  a  distinct  district  until  1879,  ^^is  the 
remarkable  growth  of  seventy-four  per  cent. 

The  population  of  London  has  nearly  doubled  itself  in  forty 
years,  and  now  displays  the  extraordinary  fact,  that  out  of  the 
entire  population  of  England  and  Wales,  a  proportion  of  one 
person  in  every  seven  resides  in  the  *'  Great  City." 

London  contains  four  hundred  and  eighty-six  thousand  two 
hundred  and  eighty-six  inhabited  houses,  with  an  avenige  of 
about  eight  persons  to  each;  while  there  are  thirty-seven 
thousand  uninhabited  dwellings,  and  eight  thousand  in  course 
of  erection.  The  area  which  may  be  apportioned  to  the  in- 
habitants of  London  gives  about  ninety-five  square  yards  to 
each  person  ;  but  each  inhabitant  has  in  the  Surrey  portion 
of  the  metropolis  twice  as  much  room  as  in  the  Middlesex 
part,  and  in  the  Kent  portion  nearly  nine  times  as  much  as  in 
Middlesex. 

Liverpool,  the  next  largest  city  in  England,  has  a  popula- 
tion of  five  hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  four  hundred  and 
twenty-five,  and  shows  an  increase  in  the  ten  years  of  fifty- 
nine  thousand  and  twenty.  Birmingham  comes  next  with 
over  four  hundred  thousand,  and  an  increase  almost  as  large 
as  Liverpool ;  and  Leeds  with  three  hundred  and  nine  thou- 
sand one  hundred  and  twenty-six,  and  an  increase  of  about 
fifty  thousand,  Sheffield  and  Bristol  have  an  aggregate  in- 
crease of  seventy  thousand;  and  Nottingham  shows  the 
enormous  growth  of  one  hundred  and  fifteen  per  cent  on  the 
return  for  1871.  Manchester,  strange  to  say,  shows  a  falling- 
off  in  her  population  of  nearly  ten  thousand  during  the  de- 
cade. 

For  the  convenience  of  enumeration,  England  and  Wales 
was  divided  into  eleven  divisions,  the  metropolis  being  one 
of  them,  the  divisions  into  counties,  the  counties  into  dis- 
tricts, and  these  again  into  sub-districts  ;^  and  amongst  the 


Ti^  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

interesting  and  valuable  results  to  be  derived  from  the  census 
we  miiy  mention :  (i)  The  age  and  sex  of  the  people,  the  dif- 
ferences in  which  regulate  the  strength  and  development.of  the 
nation.  (2)  The  mean  age  of  the  population.  (3)  The  actual  in- 
crease in  numbers.  (4)  The  successive  numbers  in  a  genera- 
tion, or  those  born  between  two  consecutive  censuses  whose 
gradual  growth  as  a  body  can  be  accurately  judged.  (5)  Th€ 
conjugal  condition  of  the  people.  (6)  The  various  occupations, 
etc.,  in  which  the  population  is  engaged,  and  the  number  to  be 
ascribed  to  each. 

It  is  the  actual  numbers  of  the  population,  showing  the 
proportion  of  each  sex  to  the  whole,  and  the  increase  or  de- 
crease of  the  population,  which  is  4:he  subject-matter  of  the 
Registrar-General's  rec6nt  report;  and  the  totals  were  ab- 
stracted from  the  census  papers  as  quickly  as  possible,  for 
the  information  of  Parliament  and  the  country. 

The  Registrar-Greneral's  second  and  more  voluminous 
report  will  not  be  made  until  the  close  of  the  census,  which 
takes  nearly  three  years  to  complete,  although  about  one 
hundred  and  twenty  clerks  are  daily  employed  on  the  work. 
The  magnitude  of  the  task  may  be  imagined  when  it  is  stated 
that  there  were  upwards  of  seven  millions  of  schedules  issued, 
and  that  each  schedule  contains  eight  columns  of  information. 
all  of  which  must  be  examined,  checked,  corrected,  abstracted, 
compared,  and  tabulated  with  the  utmost  care  and  precision. 
in  order  that  the  statistics  to  be  deduced  therefrom  may  be 
rendered  valuable  by  being  absolutely  reliable.  It  must  also 
be  remembered  that  each  of  these  schedules  contains  a  dif- 
ferent style  of  writing,  much  of  it  being  so  bad  as  to  be 
scarcely  readable,  while  in  many  instances  the  most  astonish- 
ing blunders  have  been  made ;  such,  for  instances,  as  a  wife 
appearing  as  head  of  the  household,  and  described  as  a  "  male  %" 
while  the  husband  occupies  the  second  place  and  i&  described 
as  a  *'  female."  "         .    . 

Many  hitherto  unheard-of  occupations  have  also  been  &^ 


THE.  BRITISH  CENSUS  OF  i%%\:  737 

covered  by  the  clerks  engaged  on  the  revision,  and  the 
strangest  possible  misconceptions  of  what  was  required  in  the 
geographical  and  infirmity  columns  have  been  to  them  a 
source  of  considerable  amusement. 

The  secretary  and  the  gentlemen  who  superintend  the  work 
at  the  Census  Office  are  clerks  of  the  General  Register  Office, 
or  Registrar-General's  Department  at  Somerset  House — a 
department  which  has  become  famous  for  the  reliable  and 
therefore  valuable  nature  of  its  health  statistics  and  sanitary 
observations — records  that  have  made  the  title  of  "  Registrar- 
General  of  England  "  known  wherever  the  English  language 
is  spoken. 

It  is  a  noteworthy  fact,  though  it  is  not  mentioned  in  the 
report  which  we  have  had  under  review*  that  not  a  single 
case  of  prosecution  for  refusing  information  has  occurred  in 
connection  with  the  taking  of  the  census  of  1881  ;  and,  as  far 
as  can  be  ascertained,  very  little  vestiges  remain  of  the  old 
prejudices  which  existed  in  connection  with  the  subject,  and 
especially  with  that  section  of  it  which  dealt  with  the  ages  of 
the  fair  sex.  On  the  contrary,  the  work  of  the  enumerators 
was  everywhere  lightened  by  the  fact  that  the  lapse  of  a  hun- 
dred years  has  created  a  radical  change  in  the  minds  and 
manners,  in  the  feelings  and  prejudices  of  the  English  people  ; 
while  the  spread  of  education  has  enabled  the  nation  to 
measure  its  own  strength,  and  to  fling  aside  any  childish  fears 
of  invasion  or  oppression,  knowing  full  well,  as  the  humblest 
workingman  does,  what  would  be  the  fate  of  any  minister,  or 
ministry,  who  ever  attempted,  by  means  of  the  census,  to 
violate  the  first  principles  of  the  Great  Charter. 

We  have  thus  far,  then,  given  our  readers  an  epitome  of  the 
results  of  the  recent  numbering  of  the  people  in  these  islands, 
and  the  nation  may  be  fairly  congratulated  on  the  fact  that 
it  is  still  making  a  steady  advance  in  the  path  of  prosperity ; 
for  growing  numbers  must  mean,  to  a  certain  extent,  increase 
of  wealth,  and  of  that  natural  and  physical  strength  upon 
L.  M. — 24 


738  THE  LfBRAR  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

which  the  happiness  and  n^aterial  progress  of  a  great  empire 
mainly  depend. 

From  Chambers's  Journal. 


THE  GREAT  DISCOVERY  IN  EGYPT. 

It  would  not  be  easy  to  exaggerate  the  importance  of  thq 
discovery,  announced  a  fortnight  ago,  of  thirty  royal  mum- 
mies in  the  "  Gate  of  the  Kings,'*  near  Thebes.  Some  details 
have  since  been  published  in  the  daily  papers,  and  it  is  now 
possible  to  judge  what  revelations  in  Egyptian  history  are 
about  to  be  made.  Unfortunately,  the  apathy  which  is  shown 
to  all  things  Egyptian  by  English  scholars,  and  the  rarity 
among  us  of  people  able  to  read^  hieroglyphics,  will  throw 
upon  other  countries  the  duty  and  honor  of  making  krrown  to 
the  world  the  historical  facts  which  these  newly-found  re- 
mains may  be  expected  to  give  us.  Our  overworked  officials 
at  the  British  Museum  are  taken  up  with  "  Assyriology  '^  rather 
than  "  Egyptology,'*  these  departments  of  knowledge  being 
united,  to  the  great  detriment  of  both,  in  the  only  national 
institution  in  which  such  subjects  are  studied.  Our  univer- 
sities ar3  content  to  leave  such  uninteresting  and  unimpor- 
tant branches  of  learning  to  self-taught  men,  whose  time 
should  be  devoted  to  arrangement  rather  than  reading.  The 
Egyptian  collections  in  the  British  Museum  are  but  half  cat- 
alogued, and  cannot  be  said  to  have  any  intelligible  arrai^Ch 
ment.  The  recent  move  to  the  old  geological  galleries  has 
not  led  to  any  improvement  in  a  condition  of  things  to  which 
we  have  already  more  than  once  called  attention.  But  ao 
improvement  can  be  expected  until  the  double  labor  ib^ 
cated  above  is  removed  from  the  shoulders  of*  the  ofiu^ail. 
It  is  unreasonable  to  expect  of  Dr.  Birch  and  his  very  lew  S 
sistants  that  they  should  at  once  perform  the  work  of  % 


THE  GREAT  DISCOVERY  IN  EGYPT,  759 

versity  and  of  a  Museum,  and  that,  too,  in  subjects  so  widely 
apart  and  in  themselves  so  recondite.  To  expect  the  same 
man  to  be  equally  well  acquainted  with  cuneiform  inscrip- 
tions, Egyptian  art,  early  metal  work,  and  the  detection  of 
forged  carvings,  to  say  nothing  of  a  general  knowledge  of  the 
Coptic,  Hittite,  Accadian,  and  Hebrew  languages  and  their 
cognates  is  manifestly  absurd.  We  expect  the  guardians  of 
our  public  collections  to  do  not  onfy  the  practical  and  par- 
tially mechanical  work  of  their  departments,  but  also  to  fulfill 
the  duties  of  professors  in  a  kind  of  unchartered  university. ' 
It  would  not  be  easy  to  point  to  many  of  the  learned  teachers 
of  our  great  academical  bodies  who  have  done  work  so  gene- 
rally interesting  and  important  as  that  performed  by  the  com- 
paratively unlearned  officials  of  our  museums.  A  single 
name  will  serve  to  illustrate  this  point.  We  purposely  avoifl 
mention  of  living  scholars  in  this  direction;  but  the  example 
of  the  late  Mr.  George  Smith  is  only  one  among  many  which 
could  be  adduced  to  prove  that  it  is  not  to  the  universities 
that  we  must  look  for  original  research  and  useful  as  opposed 
to  merely  ornamental  learning.  There  are,  however,  certain 
indications  that  one  of  the  Universities,  at  least,  in  the  per- 
son of  an  eminent  professor,  is  about  to  show  some  interest 
in  Egypt,  though  few  of  us  will,  in  all  probability,  live  to  see 
chairs  founded  in  England,  as  in  all  Continental  countries, 
for  the  study  of  the  arts  and  learning  of  the  cradle  of  civili- 
zation. 

Rumors  have  been  current  for  some  years  as  to  the  exist 
ence  of  a  vast  storehouse  of  antiquities  amongst  the  rocks 
and  caves  of  the  Theban  Mountains.  Every  one  who  has  as- 
cended the  Nile  as  far  as  Luxor  will  remember  the  long  nar- 
row defile  at  the  end  of  which  the  tombs  of  the  kings  are 
situated.  Most  people  who  have  threaded  the  Bab  el  Malook 
will  remember  how  short  the  distance  seemed  between  its 
innermost  recess  and  the  Dier  el  Bahari  on  the  other  side  of 
the  mountain  and  facing  towards  the  open  plain.    We  climb 


740  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE, 

.  over  the  summit  of  a  narrow  ridge,  and  have  on  bur  left  the 
Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death,  with  its  yawning  tombs,  and 
on  our  right,  almost  under  our  feet,  the  rock-cut  temple  of 
Queen  Hatasoo.  It  has  long  been  suspected  that  within  this 
ridge  there  was  probably  some  great  excavation — nay,  among 
the  travelers*  tales  of  the  last  few  years  were  to  be  heard 
stories  of  an  untold  treasure,  which  might  be  revealed  to  any 
one  who  was  armed  first  with  a  firman  permitting  him  to 
search  and  with  a  very  heavy  sum  for  backslieezh  in  addition. 
It  may  be  asked  why,  if  this  cavern  was  known  to  exist,  the 
natives  did  not  penetrate  to  it  and  bring  forth  something 
more  valuble  than  the  few  strings  of  beads  and  such-like  obP- 
jects  which  have  been  offered  to  travelers  for  sale ;  but  it 
must  be  remembered  both  that  the  Arab  is  extremely  super- 
stitious, and  also  that,  even  if  he  dared  to  penetrate  into  a 
cavern  so  full  of  afreets  as  this  must  have  been,  his  mechani- 
cal appliances  for  removing  great  weights  from  a  gallery  200 
feet  long,  Smd  a  secret  passage  leading  to  a  pit  thirty-five  feet 
deep,  would  be  utterly  insufficient.  Nevertheless,  some  one 
bolder  than  the  rest  seems  last  June  to  have  made  the  ven- 
ture. By  this  time  the  hordes  of  tourists  had  ceased  to  infest 
the  Nile  valley.  The  discovery  was  made  too  late  for  much 
profit  to  be  got  out  of  it ;  and  Daood  Pasha,  the  Governor  of 
the  district,  had  his  attention  called  to  the  abundance  and 
cheapness  of  the  objects  with  which  the  antika  market  was 
suddenly  flooded.  On  inquiry  the  pit  was  pointed  out  to 
him;  and,  with  commendable  promptitude,  he  telegraphed 
for  Herr  Emil  Brugsch,  the  assistant  curator  of  ,the  Boulak 
Museum.  Every  Egyptologist  must  envy  Herr  Brugsch  for 
the  good  fortune  which  awaited  him  when  he  arrived  in  the 
Bab  cl  ^lalook.  The  thirt}'^  mummies  which  he  found  were, 
as  he  could  read  at  a  glance,  although  he  must  have  felt  it 
difficult  to  believe  his  eyes,  those  of  all  the  most  illustrious 
monarchs  of  the  most  glorious  epoch  of  Egyptian  histofj* 
There  lay,  side  by  side.  Queen  Hatasoo,  King  Thothmes  tli^i 


THE  ORE  A  T  DISCO  VER  V  IN  EGYPT,  -  741 

and  King  Rameses  IL,  the  great  Sesostris  himself.  Of  kings 
-of  minor  note  were  nearly  all.  those  of  the  Eighteenth  Dyn- 
asty, together  with  the  father  and  grandfather  of  Rameses, 
and  his  daughter,  whose  name,  Mautnejem,  is  new  to  us.  But 
here  the  reports  may  be  in  error,  and  the  name  bean  unusual 
form  of  Maut-notem,  the  grandmother  of  Pinotem.  The 
earliest  mummy  found  is  that  of  Raskenen,  a  king  of  that  ob- 
scure dynasty  which  preceded  the  Eighteenth,  and  which  is 
sometimes  reckoned  as  the  Thirteenth  and  sometimes  as  the 
Seventeenth.  The  latest  body  is  that  of  Pinotem,  the  third 
king  of  the  Twenty-first  Dynasty,  who  reigned  as  nearly  as 
possible  a  millennium  B.  c.  In  addition  to  the  royal  mum- 
mies, a  multitude  of  objects  bearing  cartouches  will  throw 
great  light  upon  the  succession  of  these  kings  ;  and  the  tent 
of  Pinotem,  of  leather,  embroidered  and  colored,  and  covered 
with  hieroglyphics,  cannot  fail  to  clear  up  some  historical 
difficulties  as  to  the  priest-kings  of  Thebes.  It  has  been  sug- 
gested that  the  mummy  reported  to  be  that  of  Thothmes  III. 
is  in  reality  that  of  the  son  of  Pinotem,  whose  name,  Ramen 
Kcper,  is  the  throne  name  or  title  of  the  great  Eighteenth 
Dynasty  monarch  ;  but  until  all  the  inscriptions  are  read  this 
must  remain  matter  of  doubt. 

,  The  significance  of  this  remarkable  discovery  will  be  of  a 
double  character.  We  shall  perhaps  have  our  knowledge  of 
a  brilliant  period  greatly  increased  by  the  direct  evidence  of 
inscriptions  and  payyrus  rolls.  Moreover,  there  may  he 
found  some  record  of  the  circumstances  which  led  to  the 
concealment  in  one  place  of  so  many  of  the  illustrious  dead 
whose  tombs  had  already  been  prepared  for  them  in  the  Val- 
ley of  the  Kings.  The  coffin,  for  example,  of  King  Seti  I.  is, 
as  everybody  knows,  in  the  Sloane  Museum,  his  tomb  having 
been  opened  and  explored  by  Belzoni.  But  his  mummy  is 
among  tjiose  which  Herr  Brugsch  has  taken  to  Boulak.  Of 
nearly  all  the  other  kings  the  sepulchers  are  also  well  known. 
rio\^carae  they,  then,  to  have  been  placed  in  this  cavern  ? 


742.  THE  LIBRAR  V  MAGAZINE, 

It  is  evident  that  it  must  have  been  soon  after  the  close  of 
the  reign  of  Pinotem,  and  it  is  more  than  probable  that  some 
great  and  terrible  disaster  was  impending,  when  the  priests  of 
each  deceased  king — for  every  king  was  reckoned  as  a  god — 
hurriedly  took  the  precious  bodies  from  their  graves,  where 
they  lay  too  much  exposed,  and  placed  them  in  the  secret 
cavern  where  they  have  now  been  found.     If  we  consult  Dr. 
Brugsch  and  Canon  Rawlinson  as  to  the  history  of  the  time 
of  Pinotem,  we  find  a  ^erious  discrepancy  between  the  two 
latest  authorities.     Dr.  Brugsch's  view  seems  to  accord  best 
with  the  circumstances  revealed  by  his  brother's  discovery. 
He  describes  a  great  Assyrian  attack   upon  Egypt,  which 
Canon  Rawlinson  cannot  accept.    Such  an  attack,  coupled 
with  the  fact  that  we  find  Pinotem's  successor  on  the  throne 
soon  after  its  supposed  occurrence,  might  account  for  the 
concealment  of  these,  the  most  precious  of  the  royal  remains 
of  old  Egypt.    Reverting  to  the  name  of  Raskenen,  it  cannot 
be  but  that  the  discovery  of  his  body  will  throw  some'  light 
upon  that  most  interesting,  but  most  obscure,  period  when 
the  petty  kings  of  the  South  commenced  their  struggles  with 
the  shepherd  kings  of  the  North,  and  when  the  first  of  a  line 
of  Pharaohs  who  knew  not  Joseph  arose  to  drive  out  the  for- 
eigners.   Perhaps  we  may  even  recover  the  full  text  of  that 
precious  fragment  of  papyrus  which  describes  the  beginning 
'  of  the  war  between  Raskenen  of  Thebes  and  Apophis  the 
Hyksos  king.    We  must  not,  however,  be  too  sanguine  as  to 
the  contents  of  the  newly  discovered  rolls,  as  it  is  probable 
that  they  are  all  funereal,  as  no  others  were  ordinarily  buried 
with  mummies.    Still,  a  storehouse  which  contained  a  tent 
may  well  have  contained  some  portions  of  a  library — apart 
from  mere  "  Books  of  the  Dead."    The  reign  of  Queen  Hata- 
soo  will  receive  fresh  attention,  and  the  recovery  of  her  body 
— if  indeed  it  is  her  body,  and  not  that  of  one  of  the  numer- 
ous princesses  of  her  line  who  bore  the  same  name — ^may 
enable  us  to  form  some  conclusion  as  to  the  events  which 


may        | 


ANOTHER  WORLD  DOWN  HERE.  743 

placed  her  brother  Thothmes  III.  upon  the  throne.  In  short, 
there  is  hardly  any  question  respecting  the  great  middle 
period  of  Egyptian  history,  including  the  Captivity  and  the- 
Exodus  of  the  Israelites,  whicli  may  not  receive  its  answer 
through  this  amazing  discovery.  It  is,  indeed,  sad  to  think 
that  we  have  in  England  no  school  of  young  hieroglyphical 
students  whom  we  might  send  out  to  take  part  in  the  long 
and  anxious  labors  of  decipherment.  There  is  much  yet  to 
be  done  in  the  translation  and  publication  of  the  earlier  rec- 
ords. The  number  of  words  of  the  Pyramid  period  still  re- 
maining unread  is  very  great.  But  every  discovery  like  the 
present  increases  our  vocabulary;  and  though,  so  far,  our 
adoption  of  an  absurd  system  of  transliteration,  borrowed 
from  the  French,  stands  in  the  way,  we  must  hope  that  be- 
f pre  long  English  teachers  may  be  found  who  can  train  a  com- 
petent class  of  students  in  what  is  the  most  fascinating  of  all 
Oriental  languages,  and  in  some  respects  the  easiest. 

From  The  Saturday  Review. 


ANOTHER  WORLD  DOWN  HERE. 

What  a  horrible  place  must  this  world  appear  when  re- 
garded according  to  our  ideas  from  an  insect's  point  of  view. 
The  air  infested  with  huge  flying  hungry  dragons,  whose  gap- 
ing and  snapping  mouths  are  ever  intent  upon  swallowing  the 
innocent  creatures  for  whom,  according  to  the  insect,  if  he 
were  like  us,  a  properly  constructed  world  ought  to  be  exclu- 
sively adapted.  The  solid  earth  continually  shaken  by  the  ap- 
proaching tread  of  hideous  giants — moving  mountains — ^that 
crush  out  precious  lives  at  every  footstep,  an  occasional 
draught  of  the  blood  of  these  monsters,  stolen  at  life-risk,  af- 
fording but  poor  compensation  for  such  fatal  persecution. 

Let  us  hope  that  the  little  victims  are  less  like  ourselve? 


744  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

than  the  doings  of  ants  and  bees  might  lead  us  to  suppose ; 
that  their  mental  anxieties  are  not  proportionate  to  the  op- 
tical vigilance  indicated  by  the  four  thousand  eye-lenses  of 
the  common  house-fly,  the  seventeen  thousand  of  the  cabbage 
butterfly,  and  the  wide-awake  dragon-fly,  or  the  twenty-five 
thousand  possessed  by  certain  species  of^still  more  vigilant 
beetles.  \ 

Each  of  these  little  eyes  has  its  own  cornea,  its  lens,  and  a 
curious  six-sided,  transparent  prism,  at  the  back  of  which  is  a 
special  retina  spreading  out  from  a  branch  of  the  main  optic 
nerve,  which,  in  the  cockchafer  and  some  other  creatures,  is 
half  as  large  as  the  brain.  If  each  of  these  lenses  forms  a 
separate  picture  of  each  object  rather  than  a  single  mosaic  pic- 
ture, as  some  anatomists  suppose,  what  an  awful  army  of  cruel 
giants  must  the  cockchafer  behold  when  he  is  captured  by  a 
schoolboy! 

The  insect  must  see  a  whole  world  of  wonders  of  which  we  • 
know  little  or  nothing.  True,  we  have  microscopes,  with 
which  we  can  see  one  thing  at  a  time  if  carefully  laid  upon  the 
stage ;  but  what  is  the  finest  instrument  that  Ross  can  produce 
compared  to  that  with  twenty-five  thousand  object-glasses, 
all  of  them  probably  achromatic,  and  each  one  a  living  instru- 
ment with  its  own  nerve  branch  supplying  a  separate  sensa- 
tion ?  To  creatures  thus  endowed  with  microscopic  vision,  a 
cloud  of  sandy  dust  must  appear  like  an  avalanche  of  massive 
rock  fragments,  and  everything  else  proportionally  monstrous. 

One  of  the  many  delusions  engendered  by  our  human  self- 
conceit. and  habit  of  considering  the  world  as  only  such  as  we 
know  it  from  our  human  point  of  view,  is  that  of  supposing 
human  intelligence  to  be  the  only  kind  of  intelligence  in  ex- 
istence. The  fact  is,  that  what  we  call  the  lower  animals  have 
special  intelligence  of  their  own  as  far  transcending  our  intel- 
ligence as  our  peculiar  reasoning  intelligence  exceeds  theirs.  » 
We  are  as  incapable  of  following  the  track  of  a  friend  by  the 
smell  of  his  footsteps  as  a  dog  is  of  writing  a  metaphysical 
treatise. 


ANOTHER  WORLD  DOWN  HERE.  745 

So  with  insects.  They  are  probably  acquainted  with  a  whole 
world  of  physical  facts  of  which  we  are  utterly  ignorant.  Our 
auditory  apparatus  supplies  us  with  a  knowledge  of  sounds. 
What  are  th^e  sounds  ?  They  are  vibrations  of  matter  which 
are  capable  of  producing  corresponding  or  sympathetic  vibra- 
tions of  the  drums  af  our  ears  orthe.bonesof  our  skull.  When 
we  carefully  examine  the  subject,  and  count  the  number  of 
vibrations  thajt  produce  our  world  of  sounds  of  varying  pitch, 
we  find  that  the  human  ear  can  only  respond  to  a  limited 
range  of  such  vibrations.  If  they  exceed  three  thousand  per 
second,  the  sound  becomes  too  shrill  for  average  people  to 
hear  it,  though  some  exceptional  ears  can  take  up  pulsations 
or  waves  that  succeed  each  other  more  rapidly  than  this. 

Reasoning  from  the  analogy  of  stretched  strings  and  mem- 
branes, and  of  air  vibrating  in  tubes,  etc.,  we  are  justified  in 
concluding  that  the  smaller  the  drum  or  tube  the  higher  will 
be  the  note  it  produces  when  agitated,  and  the  smaller  and  the 
more  rapid  the  aerial  wave  to  which  it  will  respond.  The  drums 
of  insect  ears,  arid  the  tubes,  etc.,  connected  with  them,  are  so 
minute  that  their  world'of  sounds  probably  begins  where  ours 
ceases  ;  that  what  appears  to  us  as  a  continuous  sound  is  to 
them  a  series  of  separated  blows,  just  as  vibrations  of  ten  or 
twelve  per  second  appear  separated  to  us.  We  begin  to  hear 
such  vibrations  as  continuous  sounds  when  they  amount  to 
about  thirty  per  second.  The  insect's  continuous  sound  prob- 
ably begins  beyond  three  thousand.  The  blue-bottle  may 
thus  enjoy  a  whole  world  of  exquisite  music  of  which  we  know 
nothing. 

There  is  another  very  suggestive  peculiarity  in  the  auditory 
apparatus  of  insects.    Its  structure  and  position  are  something 

-  between  those  of  an  ear  and  of  an  eye.  Careful  examination 
of  the  head  of  one  of  our  domestic  companions — the  common 
cockroach  or  black-beetle — will  reveal  two  round  white  points 

'  somewhat  higher  than  the  base  of  the  long  outer  antennae, 
and  a  little  nearer  to  the  middle  line  of  the  head.  These  white 


74^  THE  LIBRA  R  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

projecting  spots  are  formed  by  the  outer  transparent  mem- 
brane of  a  bag  or  ball  filled  with  fluid,  which  ball  or  bag  rests 
inside  another  cavity  in  the  head.  It  resemble;^  our  own  eye 
in  having  this  external  transparent  tough  membrane  which 
corresponds  to  the  cornea,  which,  like  the  cornea,  is  backed 
by  the  fluid  in  the  ear-ball  corresponding  to  our  eye-ball,  and 
the  back  of  this  ear-ball  appears  to  receive  the  outspreadings 
of  a  nerve,  just  as  the  back  of  our  eye  is  lined  with  the  out- 
spread of  the  optic  nerve  forming  the  retina.  There  does  not 
appear  to  be  in  this  or  other  insects  a  tightly  stretched  mem- 
brane which,  like  the  membrane  of  our  ear-drum,  is  fitted  to 
take  up  bodily  air-waves  and  vibrate  responsively  to  them. 
But  it  is  evidently  adapted  to  receive  and  concentrate  some 
kind  of  vibration  or  motion  or  tremor. 

What  kind  of  motion  can  this  be  ?  What  kind  of  perception 
does  this  curious  organ  supply?  To  answer  these  questions 
we  must  travel  beyond  the  strict  limits  of  scientific  induction 
and  enter  the  fairyland  of  scientific  imagination.  We  may 
wander  here  in  safety,  provided  we  always  remember  where 
we  are,  and  keep  a  true  course  guided  by  the  compass-needle 
of  demonstrable  facts. 

I  have  said  that  the  cornea-like  membrane  of  the  insect's 
ear-bag  does  not  appear  capable  of  responding  to  bodily  air- 
waves. This  adjective  is  important,  because  there  are  vibra- 
tory movements  of  matter  that  are  not  bodily  but  molecular. 
An  analogy  may  help  to  make  this  distinction  intelligible.  I 
may  take  a  long  string  of  beads  and  shake  it  into  wave-like 
movements,  the  waves  being  formed  by  the  movements  of 
the  whole  string.  We  may  now  conceive  another  kind  of 
movement  or  vibration  by  supposing  one  bead  to  receive  a 
blow  pushing  it  forward,  this  push  to  be  communicated  to  the 
next,  then  to  the  third,  and  so  on,  producing  a  minute  running 
tremor  passing  from  end  to  end.  This  kind  of  action  may  be 
rendered  visible  by  laying  a  number  of  billiard  balls  or  marbles, 
in  line  and  bowling  an  outside  ball  against  the  end  one  of  the  * 


ANOTHER  WORLD  DOWN  HERE,  747 

row.  The  impulse  will  be  rapidly  and  invisibly  transmitted 
all  along  the  line,  and  the  outer  ball  will  respond  by  starting 
forward. 

Heat,  light,  and  electricity  are  mysterious  internal  move- 
ments of  what  we  call  matter  (some  say  *'  ether,"  which  is  but 
.  a  name  for  imaginary  matter).  These  internal  movements  are 
as  invisible  as  those  of  the  intermediate  billiard  balls ;  but  if 
there  be  a  line  of  molecules  acting  thus,  and  the  terminal  one 
strikes  an  organ  of  sense  fitted  to  receive  its  motion,  some  sort 
of  perception  may  follow.  When  such  movements  of  certain 
frequency  and  amplitude  strike  our  organs  of  vision,  the  sen- 
sation of  light  is  produced.  When  others  of  greater  ampli- 
tude and  smaller  frequency  strike  the  terminal  outspread  of 
our  common  sensory  nerves,  the  sensation  of  heat  results. 
The  difference  between  the  frequency  and  amplitude  of  the 
heat  waves  and  the  light  waves  is  but  small,  or,  strictly  speak- 
ing, there  is  no  actual  line  of  separation  lying  between  them  ; 
they  run  directly  into  each  other.  When  a  piece  of  metal  is 
g-radually  heated,  it  is  first  "black-hot";  this  is  while  the 
waves  or  molecular  tremblings  are  of  a  certain  amplitude  and 
frequency ;  as  the  frequency  increases,  and  amplitude  dimin- 
ishes (or,  to  borrow  from  musical  terms,  as  the  pitch  rises), 
the  metal  becomes  dull  red-hot;  greater  rapidity,  cherry  red ; 
g-reater  still,  bright  red ;  then  yellow-hot  and  white-hot ;  the 
luminosity  growing  as  the  rapidity  of  molecular  vibration  in- 
creases. 

There  is  no  such  gradation  between  the  most  rapid  undula- 
tions or  tremblings  that  produce  our  sensation  of  sound  and 
the  slowest  of  those  which  give  rise  to  our  sensations  of 
gentlest  warmth.  There  is  a  huge  gap  between  them,  wide 
enough  to  include  another  world  or  several  other  worlds  of 
motion,  all  lying  between  our  world  of  sounds  and  our  world 
of  heat  and  light,  and  there  is  no  good  reason  whatever  for 
supposing  that  matter  is  incapable  of  such  intermediate  activ- 
ity, or  that  such  activity  may  not  give  rise  to  intermediate 


74^     i  THE  LIBRARY  MAGAZINE. 

sensations,  provided  there  are  organs  for  taking  up  and  sensi- 
fying  (if  I  may  coin  a  desirable  word)  these  movements. 

As  already  stated,  the  limit  of  audible  tremors  is  three  to 
four  thousand  per  second,  but  the  smallest  number  of  tremors 
that  we  can  perceive  as  heat  is  between  three  and  four  mil- 
lions of  millions  per  second.  The  number  of  waves  producing  . 
red  light  is  estimated  at  four  hundred  and  seventy-four  mil- 
lions of  millions  per  second ;  and  for  the  production  of  violet 
light,  six  hundred  and  ninety-nine  millions  of  millions.  Thfee 
are  the  received  conclusions  of  our  best  mathematicians,  which 
I  repeat  on  their  authority.  Allowing,  however,  a  very  large 
margin  of  possible  error,  the  world  of  possible  sensations  ly- 
ing between  those  produced  by  a  few  thousands  of  waves  and 
any  number  of  millions  is  of  enormous  width. 

In  such  a  world  of  intermediate  activities  the  insect  prob- 
ably lives,  with  a  sense  of  vision  revealing  to  him  more  than 
our  microscopes  show  to  us,  and  with  his  minute  eye-like  ear- 
bag  sensifying  material  movements  that  lie  between  our  world 
ol  sounds  and  our  other  far-distant  worlds  of  heat  and  light. 

There  is  yet  another  indication  of  some  sort  of  intermedi- 
ate sensation  possessed  by  insects.  Many  of  them  are  not 
only  endowed  with  the  thousands  of  lenses  of  their  compound 
eyes,. but  have  in  addition  several  curious  organs  that  have 
been  designated  "  ocelli  *'  and  "  stemmata."  These  are  gener- 
ally placed  at  the  top  of  the  head,  the  thousand-fold  eyes  be- 
ing at  the  sides.  They  are  very  much  like  the  auditory  organs 
above  described — so  much  so  that  in  consulting  different  au- 
thorities for  special  information  on  the  subject  I  have  fallen 
into  some  confusion,  from  which  I  can  only  escape  by  sup- 
posing that  the  organ  which  one  anatomist  describes  as  the 
ocelli  of  certain  insects  is  regarded  as  the  auditory  apparatus 
when  examined  in  another  insect  by  another  anatomist.  All 
this  indicates  a  sort  of  continuity  of  sensation  connecting  the 
sounds  of  the  insect  world  with  the  objects  of  their  vision. 

But  these  ocular  ears  or  auditory  eyes  of  the  insect  arq  not 


ANOTHER  WORLD  DOWN  HERE,  749 

his  only  advantages  over  us.  He  has  another  sensory  organ 
to  which,  with  all  our  boasted  intellect,  we  can  claim  nothing 
that  is  comparable,  unless  it  be  our  olfactory  nerve.  The 
possibility  of  this  I  will  presently  discuss. 

I  refer  to  the  antennce  which  are  the  most  characteristic  of 
insect  organs,  and  wonderfully  developed  in  some,  as  may  be 
seen  by  examining  the  plumes  of  the  crested  gnat.  Every- 
body who  has  carefully  watched  the  doings  of  insects  must 
have  observed  the  curiously  investigative  movements  of  the 
antennae,  which  are  ever  on  the  alert  peering  and  prying  to 
right  and  left  and  upwards  and  downwards*  Huber,  who  de- 
voted his  life  to  the  study  of  bees  and  ants,  concluded  that 
these  insects  converse  with  each  other  by  movements  of  the 
antennae,  and  he  has  given  to  the  signs  thus  produced  the 
name  of  *'  antennal  language.**  They  certainly  do  communi- 
cate information  or  give  orders  by  some  means ;  aud  when 
they  stop  for  that  purpose,  they  face  each  other  and  execute 
peculiar  wavings  of  these  organs  that  are  highly  suggestive 
of  the  movements  of  the  old  semaphore  telegraph  arms. 

The  most  generally  received  opinion  is  that  these  antennae 
are  very  delicate  organs  of  touch,  but  some  recent  experi- 
ments made  by  Gustav  Hansen  indicate  that  they  are  organs 
of  smelling  or  of  some  similar  power  of  distinguishing  objects 
at  a  distance.  Flies  deprived  of  their  antennae  ceased' to  dis- 
play any  interest  in  tainted  meat  that  had  previously  proved 
very  attractive.  Other  insects  similarly  treated  appear  to  be- 
come indifferent  to  odors  generally.  He  shows  that  the  de- 
velopment of  the  antennae  in  different  species  corresponds  to 
the  power  of  smelling  which  they  seem  to  possess. 

I  am  sorely  tempted  to  add  another  argument  to  those 
brought  forward  by  Hansen,  viz.,  that  our  own  olfactory 
nerves,  and  those  of  all  our  near  mammalian  relations,  are 
curiously  like  a  pair  of  antennae. 

There  are  two  elements  in  a  nervous  structure — the  gray 
and  the  white ;  the  gray  or  ganglionic  portion  is  supposed  to 


7 so  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE. 

be  the  center  or  seat  of  nervous  power,  and  the  white  me- 
dullary or  fibrous  portion  merely  the  conductor  of  nervous 
energy. 

The  nerves  of  the  other  senses  have  their  ganglia  seated 
internally,  and  the  bundles  of  tubular  white  threads  spread 
outwards  therefrom,  but  not  so  with  the  olfactory  nervous 
apparatus.  There  are  two  horn-like  projections  thrust  for- 
ward from  the  base  of  the  brain  with  white  or  medullary 
stems  that  terminate  outwardly  or  anteriorly  in  ganglionic 
bulbs  resting  upon  what  I  may  call  the  roof  of  the  nose,  and 
throwing  out  fibers  that  are  composed,  rather  paradoxically, 
of  more  gray  matter  than  white.  In  some  quadrupeds  with 
great  power  of  smell,  these  two  nerves  extend  so  far  forward 
as  to  protrude  beyond  the  front  of  the  hemispheres  of  the 
brain,  with  bulbous  terminations  relatively  very  much  laiiger 
than  those  of  man. 

They  thus  appear  like  veritable  antennae.  In  some  of  our 
best  works  on  anatomy  of  the  brain  (Solly,  for  example)  a 
series  of  comparative  pictures  of  the  brains  of  different  ani- 
mals is  shown,  extending  from  man  to  the  cod-fish.  As  we 
proceed  downwards,  the  horn-like  projection  of  the  olfactory 
nerves  beyond  the  central  hemispheres  goes  on  extending 
more  and  more,  and  the  relative  magnitude  of  the  terminal 
ganglia  or  olfactory  lobes  increases  in  similar  order. 

We  have  only  to  omit  the  nasal  bones  and  nostrils,  to  con- 
tinue this  forward  extrusion  of  the  olfactory  nerves  and  their 
bulbs  and  branches,  to  coat  them  with  suitable  sheaths  pro- 
vided with  muscles  for  mobility,  and  we  have  the  antennae  of 
insects.  I  submit  this  view  of  the  comparative  anatomy  of 
these  organs  as  my  own  speculation,  to  be  taken  for  what  it  is 
worth. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  antennae  of  these  creatures  are 
connected  by  nerve-stalks  with  the  anterior  part  of  their  su- 
praaesophageal  ganglia,  i.  e.  the  nervous  centers  correspond- 
•ng  to  our  brain. 


ANOTHER   WORLD  DOWN  HERE.  75 1 

But  what  kind  and  degree  of  power  fnust  such  olfactory 
organs  possess  ?  The  dog  has,  relatively  to  the  rest  of  his 
brain,  a  much  greater  development  of  the  olfactory  nerves 
and  ganglia  than  man  has.  His  powers  of  smell  are  so  much 
greater  than  ours  that  we  find  it  difficult  to  conceive  the  pos- 
sibility of  what  we  actually  see  him  do.  As  an  example  1  may 
describe  an  experiment  I  made  upon  a  bloodhound  of  the  fa- 
mous Cuban  breed.  He  belonged  to  a  friend  whose  house  is 
situated  on  an  eminence^  commanding  an  extensive  view.  I 
started  from  the  garden  and  wandered  about  a  mile  away, 
crossed  several  fields  by  sinuous  courses,  climbing  over 
stiles  and  jumping  ditches,  always  keeping  the  house  in  view ; 
I  then  returned  by  qmite  a  different  track.  The  bloodhound 
was  set  upon  the  .beginning  of  my  track.  I  watched  him  from 
a  window  gajloping  rapidly,  and  following  all  its  windings 
•without  the  least  halting  or  hesitation.  It  was  as  clear  to  his 
nose  as  a  graveled  path  or  a  luminous  streak  would  be  to 
our  eyes.  On  his  return  I  went  down  to  him,  and  without 
approaching  nearer  than  five  or  six  yards  he  recognized  me 
as  the  object  of  his  search,  proving  this  by  circling  round  me, 
baying  deeply  and  savagely  though  harmlessly,  as  he  always 
kept  at  about  the  same  distance. 

If  the  difference  of  development  between  the  human  and 
canine  internal  antennae  produces  all  this  difference  of  func- 
tion, what  a  gulf  there  may  be  between  our  powers  of  per- 
ceiving material  emanations  and  those  possessed  by  insects ! 
If  my  anatomical  hypothesis  is  correct,  some  insects  have 
protruding  nasal  organs  or  out-thrust  olfactory  nerves  as 
long  as  all  the  rest  of  their  bodies.  .The  power  of  movement 
of  these  in  all  directions  affords  the  means  of  sensory  com- 
munication over  a  corresponding  range,  instead  of  being 
limited  merely  to  the  direction  of  the  nostril  openings.  In 
some  insects,  such  as  the  plumed  gnat,  the  antennae  do  not 
appear  to  be  thus  movable,  but  this  want  of  mobility  is  more 
than  compensated  by  the   multitude  of  branchings  of  these 


7S2  THE  LIBRAE  Y  MA  GAZINE, 

wonderful  organs  whereby  they  are  simultaneously  exposed 
in  every  direction.  This  structure  is  analagous  to  the  fixed 
but  nwiltiplied  eyes  of  insects,  which,  by  seeing  all  around  at 
once,  compensate  for  the  want  of  that  mobility  possessed  by 
others  that  have  but  a  single  eyeball  mounted  on  a  flexible 
and  mobile  stalk ;  that  of  the  spider,  for  example. 

Such  an  extension  of  such  a  sensory  function  is  equivalent 
to  living  in  another  world  of  which  we  have  no  knowledge 
and  can  form  no  definite  conception.  We,  by  our  senses  of 
touch  and  vision,  know  the  shapes  and  colors  of  objects,  and 
by  our  very  rudimentary  olfactory  organs  form  crude  ideasx>f 
their  chemistry  or-composition,  through  the  medium  of  their 
mateiial  emanations;  but  the  huge  exaggeration  of  this  power 
in- the  insect  should,  supply  him  with  instinctive  perceptive 
powers  of  chemical  analysis,  a  direct  acquaintance  with  the 
inner  molecular  constitution  of  matter  far  clearer  and  deeper 
than  we  are  able  to  obtain  by  all  the  refinements  of  laboratory 
analysis  or  the  hypothetical  formulating  of  molecular  mathe- 
maticians. Add  this  to  the  other  world  of  sensations  produ- 
cible by  the  vibratory  movements  of  matter  lying  between 
those  perceptible  by  our  organs  of  hearing  and  vision,  then 
strain  your  imagination  to  its  cracking  point,  and  you  will 
still  fail  to  picture  the  wonderland  in  which  the  smallest  of 
our  fellow-creatures  may  be  living,  moving,  and  having  their 
being. 

W.  Mattieu  Williams,  in  Belgravia, 


INDEX. 


PAOB 

Account  of  the  Remoral  of  the  Bodies  of  Cromwell,  Bradshaw,  and  Ireton 821 

Accuracj  necessary 40 

A  Day  with  Liszt  in  1880.    H.  R.  Haweis 106 

.Snefd.  The,  inferior  to  Homer 293 

^Esthetics,  The,  in  Parliament.    Justin  H.  McCarthy 87 

Agricultural  Settlers,  The  United  States  as  a  Field  for.    The  Earl  of  Alrlie 33 1 

Alexander  Stralian.    Sir  David  Brewster  and  Sir  John  Herschel 421 

AlUngrhara,  William.    TheFirst  English  Poet 549 

Alphabetical!  and  English  Expositor.    Henry  Cockeram 604 

Among  the  Clouds 266 

Among  the  Dictionaries.    Comhill  Magazine 592 

Amusement  the  Sole  Aim  of  some  Writers. 844 

••^An  Alvearie."   John  Baret , 6U0 

Ancient  Use  of  Cuneiform  Writing 661 

Anecdotes  of  Bibles.    Chambers's  Journal 541 

A  i^ight  on  Mount  Washington.    Prof .  G.  W.  Blaikle 257 

Archaisms  removed  and  Proper  Names  consistently  translated 418 

Arnold  in  History 54 

Art 17 

A  Vermont  Buskin.    The  Spectator 17 

Bad  Novels  do  Irretrievable  Harm 849 

Beaconsfleld.  Fame  of ; 457 

Beauties  of  the  Poetiy  of  Homer 290 

Beethoven  greeting  Liszt , 114 

Beyond.    David  Swing , 11 

Bible,  The 859 

The  "Breeches".. 544 

The  "Treacle** ^ 544 

The  "Vinegar" 544 

Bibles.  Anecdotes  of .    Chambers's  Journal 541 

Birthday  of  Shakespeare 125 

Blackwood's  Marazlne.    "Gil  Bias" , 173 

BlHikleiProf.  G.  W.    A  Night  on  Mount  Washington 257 

Blake,  William.    Frederick  Wedmore 615 

Bonaparte.    J.  R.  Seeley / 552 

Personality  of s 568 

Power  of,  with  the  Revolution 554 

Bondage,  Distinctions  between 221 

Books,  How  to  read.    John  Dennis »>6 

How  to  use 3r)7 

must  beloved  wisely 8G9 

Suitable 853 

Bookworm.  Gossip  of  an  Old.    W.  J.  Thoms 637 

Boyhood  of  Carlyie 4i4 

Bret  Harte,  Francis.    M.S.  V.de  V m. 

Brewster,  Sir  Divld,  a  Contributor  to  Magazines 427 

Brotherhood  of  Science 85 

Browni^ig's.  Mrs.  Barrett,  verses  on  "Flush" -. ?M 

BUlowand  Rubensteln .\ 116 

Bundle  of  Words.    Cotgrave 601 

Bunker  Hill  Monument  Association 869 

William  Prescott  ajt.    Robert  C.  Wlnthrop 889 

Byron  in  Greece.    Temple  Bar 271 

Byron's  Dogs— Boatswain  and  Nelson. 707 


754 


INDEX, 


PAcri 

Cnnludct.  (JlmUfl* . * . .  -*-,. J49 

Cjii'ljJe  JMa  Bciy.^.. ,.  4M 

aa  a  Lecturer ..* .*,.^,,.^* 288 

HlA  OfTvUJivct  Haiiner -. 204 

niii  SuduitAs, ........ .p 206 

fip^nltK  Dn  DlvjDaiJon 287 

Jameft,    By  TJioiiias  Carlyle..,^.* -. 190 

^']!].i]iii.Hah    llrH.  olttihanc. 187 

Tlioinas,  E,url>  Uffior    J.  A.  Fpoude 491 

Carlyle'9  LcL'^tiirefi  on  tht'  PwrloUs  of  European  Culture.    Prof.  Edward  Dowden..  288 

Sk«i;tM>f  hlBWlfit 194 

Cattle'ft.'ar(i)ff  In  tin?  tJDited  Btateis. OT 

CtnstiiR,  Tho  Brltlwh.  of  \^\..... 728 

Cb^Lrk^Dlvkeiis  Lu  thi^Edlwr'eCitalT.    Qentleman's  Magazine 496 

Chtjice  nf  Ph)fes.Hlan,  Reajiou*  for,, 178 

ChHfitiftU ft y  rMvi^aJii  tlie  Dignity  of  Human  Sorrow 2M 

CJ,4vlmH  of  itrL't  Harte  to  Pat^uiarlty 687 

Ciltu!B  ri^tlnurl'ina «-«^><4 23 

Clli3«e  df  CiirlyliV!»  Am>rfiitic{.''bihipH«.H ..«.. 888 

CoHL'ht^eon  Mount  Wftslilngr^n........... 268 

Cufil,  EiEHl  AirtfHca,  IjifluGn(.-e  of^  on  Engliond » 588 

CitkirnrlOi  i.^neAEs  of ,., * 838 

Qokmdoatid  Denver.  Bevelopm^nt  of,^ 88S 

Oom e< ties  of  Shiifet^Hi ware,...  .♦......, 180 

Q^umXwXvXi^Xixn  Eilltlon  of  ffciw  Testament— the  first  printed 406 

CimfijUTiiUiiR  On(?  Word  wkk  another  avoided 420 

Coil  lervnt  rum  of  tlhc  Sr^uth, ., , ,..*,.,.*. -  751 

ConsUlcratlon  to  AutTsiirs  dlsplajeHj  br  Uickens 448 

Uonxvnv,  MrW.    Tin*  Flmt  Prtniefl  Bnok  Jtnown «, 898 

tTr„i,,,s-,.!l    riijv.^r      "u  vt.-,ri»""^  H"!--Lr>i 816 

^\  hrL  '                '  ''dyof?   Gentleman's  Magasine 811 

Crom well's  Burial-place 814 

Crosby,  Joseph.    The  Study  of  Shakespeare 121 

Cuneiform  writing.    W.  O.  Sproull,  Ph.D 661 

Donrlnff-^thfuol  Brtll .►. 308 

DUDte  rntitrfii^U'cl  wlith  Hume ., •. 806 

Ht«  artmfncas  of  Heart  ftit^T  fntellpct 297  • 

P^nnlRn  John.    How  to  rear!  Hoolrs,,,, — 856 

Dfucrfptlnn  fff  Jfltnefl  CaTlylt-.    Thomnft  Harlyle 499 

I>k't[onaHt'H,  AinoTi^  the.    CoruhlU  Jla^^^izlue 0B3 

"  Dk'tlOTiaiT-"    Johfi  Mlnfthf^u ., 6l« 

nifTeTPTiee  between  Humor  \\\\(\  Wft , 299 

TftffkTf-nt  Klndftof  r*nnfi|frtrn]  ^rlrlnir 666 

lfI(Ti'iPiitinit<jn,  rolltJtr.al.    Herbert  Spentjer 215 

Ii"ii;:q  iif  I.lrcrfii^iirp.    THmplt;  Ear... 695 

iKm  jLjjin  Antfink*  Llorenre,  im  "Gil  Bla*" 155 

Hn  wdon^  Ptof.  1£A  WfiK],    Cariyli-'s  l.*ctu  res  on  the  Periods  of  European  Culture  28S 

DoTo!opy  to  tbo  Lord^A  Pmyer,  Evidence  against  the a 413 

Dryilen.  Rapidity  of  TlioiiKhC  nf , 140 

Dut1«'Blncoml>HF*nt  nil  Kvery  Wrltflr.n.** 180 

]>y4pt^pflla,  Its  EffiH^Lson  Carlyte,.,,,. 521 

EArlof  AlHlP.    TtipOnitpfl  Stfttes  aa  a  Field  for  Agricultural  Settlers 887 

£^rly  Hl:st0ry  ofthe  Cnrlyli?!  Family.... *., 491 

Ltfe  of  ThumfiB  Cnrlyla    J.  A.  Ffoude 491 

SpttlPFft  of  f  hii  Routh . . . , , . , 6S 

iCcpTrfofhFvn,  tht-  Birth-plflt't?  of  Tlionias  Carlyle 493 

E-ntoT'A  ChA.lt.  Ch^rie!' Dlclirnn  In  the.    (^enUeman's  Magazine 486 

Fiittf'iitloT]— Fi  Prkf^.^lfhn  In  Scotland., 494 

Jlirym,  Thp  Gre,it  OlRfoverv  In.    Tlie  Snturrtoy  Review 788 

Klectir^t  Syfltem  of  Ei^cland  cr^Utdi  by  Blaraeli 460 

F.nilirrnntHK  Opporttmttie-^  for. «,,.,^.., S39 

P.tiL't'iTifl,  PoptiHtInn  of.. .,,.... .'. \ 730 

J^dTisllfiJi  and  AmrrlpaTi  KnBr!i>;h+    Elchard  A.  Proctor €70 

Eti«l)sbirT>fin,  Tbf>,  a  j^urEit  AnTmal 65 

KnuMRh  Npw  Ti?!(rarn{>iit,  Buviiiriri  y(trft(nn  cif  the.    Alexander  Roberts,  D.D 408 

EinjllflhfirthoftTTipliv.    F.  A.  >Tftrcb.T.L.D  .., 33 

Foot,  The  First.    Wllllain  ALUnBhiun 510 


INDEX,  75  s 


PAOK 

Entering  the  Unirerslty.... 500 

Erasmus  as  Translator 403 

Errora  in  the  Eariv  Bibles 642 

Escape  of  Byron  from  being  captured 279 

European  Culture,  Carlyle's  Lectures  on  tlie  Periods  of  the.    Prof.  Edward 

Dowden 283 

Everett,  A.  H.    "Gil  Bias" 156 

Exercitium  super  Pater  Noster , 896 

Facts  and  Fancies  of  Mr.  Darwin 426 

Faith,  Newman's  Ideas  of 84 

False  Doctrine 83 

Familiar  Americanisms,  Examples  of 692 

Favorable  Position  occupied  by  England 586 

First  Printed  Book  known.    M.  W.  Conway 893 

First  Regular  Battle  of  the  American  Revolution 882 

Franceson,  Charles  Frederic.    Essay  on  "  Gil  Bias" 162 

Francis  Bret  Harte.    M.  S.  V.deV 631 

Fraudulent  Land  Agencies 840 

French  Revolution,  The,  the  Most  Frightful  Phenomena  EverSeen 808 

Froude.  J.  A.    Early  Life  of  Thomas  Carlyle.. 491 

Reminiscences  of  the  High  Church  Revival 74 

Freeman,  Edward  A.    Study  of  History 82 

Fust,  John,Bibleof 547 

Oenlns  and  Method.    Temple  Bar 136 

•*  Gil  Bias"?  Who  wrote.    Henri  Van  Laun 151 

"  aiossograpbia  Angllca  Nova,"  published  in  1707 606 

"  Glossographia,"  by  Thomas  Blount 604 

Gossip  of  an  Old  Bookworm.    W.  J.  Thorns 637 

Grain,  Prices  of ,  in  Different  States 834 

Great  Writers,  Methods  of 146 

Greece,  Byron  in.    Temple  Bar 271 

Hamlet,  Fascination  of .  .^ 128 

Harleian  Miscellany— Account  of  Burial  of  Cromwell 817 

Hdweis,H.  R.    A  Day  with  Liszt  in  1880 106 

Heroic  Lives,  lived  not  written 296 

Herschel,  Sir  John,  Contributor  to  (Jood  Words 431 

Hli^h  Church  Revival,  Reminiscences  of  the.    James  Anthony  Froude 74 

Hildebrand  not  a  Proud  Man 295 

History  a  Practical  Science 52 

How  to  be  studied 67 

of  a  Sonnet 139 

Study  of.    Edward  A.  Freeman 82 

the  Study  of  Man 45 

Homer,  The  Poetry  of 289 

House  of  Commons,  Vote  passad  In 319 

How  to  read  Books.    John  Dennis .- 856 

remember  what  is  read 866 

write  a  Novel 845 

Hiieffcr,  Francis.    Modem  Italian  Poets 236 

Hume  as  a  Historian   , 806 

Hunt,  William  Morris.    Ci^ticlsmof  his  Paintings 20 

Xde alism,  or  Imagination 12 

Xlliteracy  a  Pressing  Danger 23 

Imperfections  In  English  Spelling 23 

Influence  of  the  Norman  Conquest  on  the  History  of  London 584 

In  J  ustlce  of  the  Carthaginians 292 

Interest  In  Dogs  shown  by  Charles  Dickens .^ 717 

Irving  and  Carlyle  give  up  Teaching ^. 517 

receiving  Carlyle 50i> 

Trving'fl  Friendship  for  Carlyle 536 

I  taliuu  and  Belgian  Bells 110 

Poets,  Modern.    Francis  Huefter 2;)6 

JTacobln  ism.  Overthrow  of ^^^^ ^56 

Tourney  to  Greece,  Byron's :T^. 273 

jrustica  to  Beaconsfleld 496 


756. 


INDEX. 


PAOI 

Last  Poem  by  Byron 26S 

Le  Sage's  Farce 152 

l£xin$ton,  Concord,  and  Bunker  Hill 373 

Life  of  Chopin.    P.  Liszt 118 

LlaztjaDavwith,  Inl880.    H.  R.  Hawels H« 

asaMuslcian lU 

Literature  as  a  Trade 61 

Dogs  of*    Temple  Bar €95 

London,  Main  Elements  of,  at  the  Present  Time SBl 

Population  of , 'kZ 

The  Orlaln  of.    Comhlll  Magazine Sil 

Lope  de  Vega— His  Literary  FccunOlty 143 

Luther,  Cariyle's  Estimation  of ^ 810 

Luthel"8  Table  Talk 118 

Macbeth,  Traits  of 1?7 

McCarthy,  Justin  H.    The  ^Esthetics  In  Parliament 87 

" Manlpulua  Vocabulorum,"  printed  in  1570... 966 

March.  F.  A.,  LL.D.    English  Orthography 2S 

MentalTraltsproducedby  Exercise  of  Power J27 

Method  and  Qenlus.    Temple  Bar i 186 

of  declining  Offered  Manuscript 440 

MUton,  John,  as  a  Reviser 18ft 

too  sectarian 908 

Mistakes  In  New  Testament  Grammar  rectified 417 

Modern  Italian  Poets.    Francis  Hueffer 281 

Mouey  necessary  for  Successful  Emigration , 890 

MorgaUjDanlel,  with  William  Prescott : 887 

Mount  Washington,  A  Night  on.    Prof .  G.  W.  Blalkle 907 

Description  of SH) 

Railroad Vi 

View  from 9tt 

Necessity  oflMedltation  and  Toll 187 

Necrol  glum  VIrldls  Vollis aM 

New  England's  Mountains 2G8 

Ne  w  En gla  nd.  Young  Women  of 968 

Newman,  John  Henry 74 

as  a  Preacher \ 81 

Newman's  Oratory 88 

New  Testament  Company,  Constitution  of VA 

"New  World  of  Words,"  by  Edward  Phillips €05 

Novel-making  not  an  Impulse 84S 

Novelsand  Novel-makers.   Good  Words Sfi 

OfBceof  Charles  Dickens 487 

Old  Bookstores M8 

Oliphant,  Mrs.    Thomas  Carlyle 187 

Omissions  In  the  Revised  Version,  Evidence  In  Favor  of 413 

Origin  of  Early  Names 5Sf 

London.    Comhlll  Magazine 8Q 

Orthography,  English.   F.  A.  March,  LL.D , 99 

Pafranlnl's  Performances .^ IM 

Peculiarities  of  Charles  Dickens 4S 

Phouetle  Journal,  Isaac  Pitman's 94 

Plantation  Library,  A : 81 

Life  a  Hindrance  to  Mental  Activity 87 

Foot,  The  First  English.    William  Allingham 50 

Political  Differentiation.    Herbert  Spencer IB 

Pomei  lum  Splritnale , ' 4V 

Poor  Copy  an  Offense  to  All M? 

Positive  Mistakes  of  the  Greek  corrected IM  i 

"Poshema,"  by  Lorenzo  Stecchetti \ 

Pratra,E.nilio : , L_  , 

Prayer-Books,  Anecdotes  of i 90 

Preseott's  Battle |M  I 

Preston,  Margaret  J.    Literary  Profession  In  the  South \\\,  m\ 

Prices  of  Western  Lands M 


Printed  B>>oJ£,  The  First  known.*  *  M.'w.  Conway  * 


INDEX.  757 

PAOS 

Printing-press,  Th©  Earliest  known i 403 

Profession,  Jjlterary ,  In  the  South.    Manraret  J.  Preston 60 

of  Letters,  The  Morality  of  the.    Robert  Louis  Sterenson 176 

"  Promptorlum  Parvulorum,"  the  First  Dictionary  ., 597 

Pronunciation,  Changes  in 678 

Public  Opinion  or  Feeling 179 

Beading  aloud 867 

A  Plan  for 863 

wlthaPurpose 861 

Religion  a  Personal  Matter 80 

Benilnlscences  of  the  High  Church  Revival.    J.  A.  Froude 74 

Revised  Version  of  the  English  New  Testament.    Alexander  Roberts,  D.D 403 

•Richelieu,  The  Fate  of 812 

Rip  Van  Winkle  and  his  Dog  Wolf 722 

Ruskln,  A  Vermont.    Spectator ^...  17 

Sainthlll^  Remark  upon  'Cromwell 824 

Seeley,  J.  R.    Bonaparte , 552 

Shakespeare  and  Ejiox 808 

Power  of 135 

TheStudyof.    Joseph  Crosbv 121 

The  Epitome  of  the  Age  of  Elizabeth 802 

**  Shorte  Dlctlonarle  in  Latin  and  English,  verle  profitable  for  yong  Beginners.".  599 

«hort  Meditations  on  Oliver  Cromwell 822 

Sir  David  Brewster  and  Sir  John  Herschel.    Alexander  Strahan 424 

Sixpenny  Box  at  a  Bookstall '. 643 

Skepticism,  The  Consummation  of 807 

Skull  of  Cromwell,  its  History . . '.  825 

£lavesan  Incldentof  War ; 217 

Social  Position,  Inequalities  of 284 

Bongs  of  Experience,  bv  William  Blake 628 

Innocence,     '^        "           *'       623 

eouthey*s  Poem  on  the  Dog  Theron 712 

Specimens  of  Carlyle's  Letters 502 

Spencer,  Herbert.    Political  Differentiation 215 

Steel  losing  Its  Position 462 

Stevenson,  Robert  Louis.    The  Morality  of  the  Profession  of  Letters 176 

etudy  of  History.    Edward  A.  Freeman 82 

gwlnbume's  Sympathy 183 

Swlnc,  David.    Beyond 11 

fSword  and  Gun  compared 4'^ 

of  Wm.Prescott 892 

The.   Blackwood's  Magazine 461 

Talbot,  The  Pate  of 812 

Thames,  The,  gives  Conditions  necessaiy  for  Commerce 576 

The  Literary  Prof esslon  in  the  South.    Margaret  J.  Preston 60 

Morality  of  the  Profession  of  Letters.    Robert  Louis  Stevenson 176 

Study  of  Shakespeare.    Joseph  Crosby 121 

Sword.    Blackwood's  Magazine 461 

United  States  as  a  Field  for  Agricultural  Settlers.    The  Earl  of  Alrlle 827 

Thomas  Oarlyle.    Mrs.  OUphant 187 

Towle,  OeorgeM.    Justice  to  Beaconslleld 456 

TwoClassesof  Agricultural  Emigrants 828 

Words  explained— Literature  and  Culture 860 

tJlrlch  Hutten— A  Straggler .,, 801 

Universal  Etymological  English  Dictionary,  by  Nathan  Bailey 607 

Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Frederick 196 

Van  den  Bosraert,  Prior  of  Groenendael 894 

Van  Laun,  Henri.    Who  wrote  "GU  Bias"? 151 

Varieties  of  Swords 479 

Virgil's  Method  of  Work 148 

"Woflmeras  a  Visitor , 113 

"Waiter  Scott's  Two  Dogs— Camp  and  Malda : .  699 

War,  The  Horrors  of,  greatly  reduced. 472 


758  INDEX. 


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_^  PAOB 

Warren,  Joseph,  at  Banker  Hill .• 880 

Waverley  Novels,  Judgment  of  the 866 

Wedmore,  Frederick.    William  Blake 615 

What  became  of  Cromwell?    Gentleman's  Magazine SIl 

is  to  be  the  Fate  of  the  Revised  Version? 421 

Whlmsof  Writers ^ .» 149 

Who  wrote  "  Gil  Bias  "?    Henri  Van  iAun 151 

Why  should  the  Capital  of  the  British  Empire  be  at  Westminster? 57 

William  Blake.    Frederick  Wedmore 615 

Prescott  at  Bunker  Hill.    Robert  C.  Winthrop 369 

the  Conquerorand  Henry  the  Eighth 50 

Winthrop,  Robert  C.    William  Prescott  at  Bunker  Hill 369 

Women,  Conditions  of 215 

of  India 13 

WordSiJthe  Different  Us^  of ,  in  England  and  America 686 

^b  be  Changed , 27 

World,  Another,  down  Here.    W.  Hattleu  Williams 748 

Writers,  Suggestions tOjby  Charles  Dickens 444 

Writing,  Cuneiform.   W.  O.  Sproull,  Ph.D 661 


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